


Flashpoint

by DestinyxDarkness



Series: The rebellion to the Alpha/Beta/Omega universe [3]
Category: Borderlands (Video Games), Cool Patrol - Ninja Sex Party (Song), Get Good Gaming (Youtube), Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF), Team Edge (Youtube), Who Killed Markiplier? (Web Series)
Genre: Alpha Handsome Jack (Borderlands), Badass characters, Bittersweet Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Established Relationship, Explosions, F/M, Female Protagonist, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Multi, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Original Character Death(s), Self-Sacrifice, Series Finale, Space Battles, War, several deaths
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-13
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:40:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 18
Words: 83,913
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23624020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DestinyxDarkness/pseuds/DestinyxDarkness
Summary: The Alpha War; the looming event hanging over both Allison Howell and Mila Tanthree respectively. The both of them have spent countless years preparing the P.W.C. and Pandora for the day that the Alpha would charge upon that desert planet, who are planning on taking it over and ruling their solar system with an unfair prejudice towards their class type.On the twentieth year since beginning to prepare (eighteenth for Mila, as she got a two year break in contrast), a distinct change occurs in the space and sky over Pandora... The army had arrived.(Has heavy references to both prequel books 'Show me your smile' and 'Two to Tango')
Relationships: Chris Kendall/Original Female Character(s), Connor Melville/Original Female Character(s), Dan Howell/Original Female Character(s), Handsome Jack/Danny Sexbang, Joseph "Joey" Frederick/Original Female Character(s), Joshua "Gunner" Gomez/Original Female Character(s), Mark Fischbach/Original Female Character(s), Original Male Character(s)/Original Male Character(s), PJ Liguori/Original Female Character(s), Paul Kennedy/Original Female Character(s), Phil Lester/Original Female Character(s), Robert "Bobby" Fredrick/Original Female Character(s), Sean McLoughlin/Original Female Character(s), Tanner Malmedal/Original Female Character(s)
Series: The rebellion to the Alpha/Beta/Omega universe [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/916863
Comments: 24
Kudos: 4





	1. The Dawn of the War; Code Red-Red

**End of record - Revenge**

Matthias whirled around in his chair, effectively asking me what I thought of the last little record he had made. I giggled softly, as it only served to make me realise that Jfred's paranoid claims of his older brother monitoring everything going on... Was more correct than he realised.

"Honestly, I didn't even know you were keeping different records of that time eighteen years ago" I couldn't help but feel like it was yesterday that I had experienced them, not so many years. My differing attire and hair would naturally stand out as different from so long ago, as I almost permanently walked around with my hair in a bun along with the weaponized skirt and sweater upon my body. The latter was more down to Connor's still brilliant mind, while my hair was simply down to my long-time partner preferring my hair longer and more luscious. "Why did you only make records of the time that I had joined up to the capture of the Helicarrier?"

"It's being combined into the electronic package that we'll be sending out to everyone on Alfu when the army arrives; giving people a sense of what kind of danger they actually pose" Matthias gave his reasoning, slowly scratching one side of the beard he had grown. It was something that he too had grown in the eighteen years since I had first joined his company (and subsequent movement), but I had to admit that my opinion of it didn't matter as much as his wife's did. "After gaining the Helicarrier, our run ins with Alpha have never gone as sour as back then, so it seemed more accurate to show those"

It was true; after gaining the Helicarrier the Alpha seemed to suddenly lose all of their bravado against us. While they still kept growing in numbers on their five battlecruisers, they never attempted to take back their coveted Helicarrier despite them likely being able to with their superior numbers. I could only surmise that it was because we had shifted our position to hover over the main city on Alfu; that the Alpha were afraid of giving themselves away before they launched against Pandora.

Because of their lackadaisical approach to handling us, our own numbers had grown vastly as we reached out for support against the growing conflict. While at the time of the records we only held nineteen members of our movement, we had soared to new heights in terms of followers the moment we stopped slithering in the shadows. By that year, we held sixty millions followers, exceeding Blaire's estimation for our maximum capacity. In order to not feel swamped in those quarters, around twenty five of those sixty million purely were situated in the hangers of the ship; itching for the day they could launch their fighters against the five battlecruisers that would be housing our enemies.

While it certainly sounded attainable to shoot down and destroy a number of the battlecruisers before they even reached the planet's surface, there was a good possibility that our own Helicarrier would be shot down in turn. With this massive glaring possibility staring us in the face, Corey and Trent had soon been ordered to focus all of their collective power (as well as forty million engineers) to upgrade shielding and armour on our massive ship. Anyone who had seen the craft before likely couldn't have recognised it anymore, not with the upgrades we had made, but we knew that lasting long against the enemy would have to be one of the main priorities.

"Boss!" One of our more loyal recruits, I believe his name was CJ, came bustling into Matthias' room to report something. He was occasionally a little disorganised, but he was good at his job, so his important role of messenger throughout the ship was not something to be sneezed at. We were unsure who exactly he was referring to in the superior sense, but it didn't truly matter as both Matthias and I likely would have wanted to hear this news anyway. "I am pleased to report that the ship wide communication vectors have been installed, so reports can come in without any kind of delay or interference"

"If that's the case, why didn't you just use the new vectors to contact us rather than running all the way here?" Matthias asked the underling with a raised eyebrow, but I could tell that it had to have been the older man trying to tease him. After all, Matthias had specifically engineered his own room to not have any outside signals coming in, so contacting us while we were in there was impossible. It was when CJ actually started to look uncertain about how he was supposed to answer that, that Matthias grinned like some old codger who had told a silly joke. "I'm pulling your leg CJ, I know you can't reach in here with the vectors"

"Ah, of course. I-I knew that sir" CJ tried to bluff that he had known all along that it was nothing more than a jape, but the slight stutter in his sentence gave himself away. "Oh, I also had a message from commander Jfred that all of the ships have been checked... Again, and that they are still in correct working condition"

" _Commander Jfred_ " Matthias sighed internally, still not used to the name being addressed to his younger brother. Even as Jfred had gotten married, had a child, and been present for the entire eighteen years, it still seemed that the title of Commander didn't sit correctly with any of the three brothers who had started it all. "Thank you CJ, you can return to your post in the bridge"

"Sir" CJ respectively gave the both of us a salute before leaving the room, darting off to the bridge for the next task on his endless list of responsibilities. It was kind of sad when you thought about it too hard, that such a young kid was running around like a war was something normal in this day and age.

"...He's about the age of Luna right now" He sighed again, and I knew by then that I had to divert his attention to something else. Matthias was by far the best organizer for the movement (beyond myself), but he did occasionally have a propensity for getting melancholic and second guessing himself. When I placed a hand on his shoulder to remind him that I was still there, that everyone in our nineteen strong pack still was, he seemed to straighten himself out nicely. "You're right, let's focus on something else"

"I guess that's one of the downsides to it being the eighteenth year since we started preparing; everything is already completed" While I was glad to see that he could still alter his mind to something else if it was really required, by that point there wasn't really anything to change his mind to. We had crossed into the New Year expecting the Alpha army to go charging off immediately, but it had been three months and there was no sign of movement in our sensors of their battlecruisers around Alfenheim. It was like waiting for the inevitable snapping noise of a mouse trap; you knew it was coming... But for some reason it was taking achingly long to set itself off. "...I have to admit, I am kind of hoping that they've completely lost their nerve"

"Hah, wouldn't that be a dream come true?" Matthias agreed, as while we were more than ready to face them by that point, it didn't make the anxiety of facing off against them any less. He and I travelled towards the bridge, as not only was it the main point of operations for the entire ship, but it was where the majority of our pack stayed in the last three months if they had nothing to do.

True to what I had expected, all remaining seventeen of our pack were spread about amongst the stations on the bridge. Not many people had changed in the passage of time, which surprised me to notice when I thought about it. There was the occasional change in hair style or amount of facial hair on people’s faces (honestly, the most common change came down to Katra changing her mind on what colour hair she wanted to die her bob to this time), but there was no actual thing different that would have made it difficult for me to recognise them if I had left for a while and returned later. The first one to notice Matthias and my addition was Paul, him turning his head the moment he could pick up the slight anxiety in both of our minds.

"Hey darling" Paul greeted me with his usual term of endearment, smiling at me as he came close to give me an affectionate kiss. It did wonders, causing me to ease ever so slightly with my jittery nerves. The only real difference between him eighteen years ago and now was that he had truly taken his training seriously, his muscles now a lean type rather than the skinny and bony type he had been before. "Still nervous?"

"That's probably only going to go away once this war is over" I slipped my hand into his as we talked idly, as he did make me feel far more comfortable in those moments. "Matthias and I were just talking between ourselves about how much nicer it would be if the Alpha had changed their mind considering the amount of resistance they are encountering now"

"I'm not sure how reassuring that would be" Bobby chimed in a couple of seats away, his usual baritone only being slightly dulled by the tired drawl, as he had been on the shift the previous night. "Some battlecruisers hanging around in orbit of some planet until the end of time? No thanks, I'd rather they get on with it"

It seemed almost as if the universe was going to grant him his wish, as a high importance notification popped up on screen. Despite several people nearly jolting out of their seats, they soon read that it was nothing more than a communication request from the planet of Pandora, which had been given a high importance due to our alliance with the people on that planet.

"Put them on screen" I decided to accept it, as I couldn't really see a reason to refuse to talk to whoever it was. Just as I had expected, a blonde female appeared on screen, her steely blue eyes reminding people that she certainly was not going to be giving up without a fight. Her name was Allison Howell (simply referred to as Ally by the majority of us), and she was the face of the resistance on the surface of Pandora. Not only that, but she was already well known by the more senior members of our pack.

"Ally! So good to see you!" Jfred greeted her casually, as the two of them were about the same age as each other and had a developed bond that sharply resembled the both of them being rambunctious cousins rather than old co-workers. "Have you got more wrinkles the last time I saw you?"

Several people in the bridge murmured uncertainly under their breath, as by that point Ally had built up quite the reputation and respect in our group for her total overhaul of not only Pandora, but the ice moon Elpis into liveable places rather than death traps. To them, asking someone that question was exceedingly rude... But they had yet to see for themselves that Ally was not the kind of person to be so easily upset by such remarks.

"And you have more grey in your hair" She easily countered his remark, a cheeky grin present on her face as Jfred pretended to be deeply wounded by the remark. When she laughed, it was then clear to everyone who had yet to meet her in such a situation that she was someone who enjoyed a good joke here and there... Especially when you considered the fact that she had no wrinkles, and Jfred had no grey in his hair. His hair was possibly balding by that point, but that was unimportant. "I was wondering if you guys were hiding the fight from us by now, as we haven't seen any sign of the Alpha army arriving. The main travel ways are still being monitored, but it's completely silent"

"We could say the same for you, we haven't seen the battle cruisers making a move yet" I directed her attention back over to me by speaking in an authoritative tone, something that her natural Alpha blood responded to like a duck to water. It had certainly taken me by surprise that the main person on Pandora who had sought to overthrow the Alpha army coming their way... Was an Alpha herself. But I supposed that being raised by Beta and going through her own journey to save others from such tyrannical Alpha would certainly change someone's view. "How are things going on your end?"

"Everything is prepared in terms of weaponry and troops, but we are still running into some trouble from the local wildlife" She seemed to roll her eyes, not quite understanding why the flora and fauna was so intent on killing everything in sight. After all, most creatures wouldn't even eat the carcasses of their kills, so it seemed entirely pointless in the terms of 'the circle of life'. "As for the people who are not being involved in the war, they're hiding in bunkers all over the planet. They may be going stir crazy already, but they're only to come out once the all clear is given by one of our party"

There was a burning question on the tip of my tongue, wondering what the people in the bunker were supposed to do in case there were no more survivors from their side, but I supposed that the answer was obvious. If all of us in the Helicarrier also faced a similar fate, then not being let out after all the fighting was done would be a sign in itself on which side had won the war. Asking what the plan was in case the Alpha won seemed to also be moot, as that was not important within our minds. We were going to win, no matter the cost.

It was right then that one of her sentences seemed to be interrupted with a loud blaring siren blowing through the bridge. No, not only the bridge, as when I listened intently it sounded like it was reverberating throughout the rest of the ship as well. It caused people to sit up attentively in their seats once again, and it seemed that this time their readiness was rewarded; The large lettering flashing throughout the entire ship in bold red letters told everyone that it was a Code Red-Red.

"Mila, what's going on? Are you under attack?" Ally managed to shout just enough so that her voice could be heard over the blaring siren, but not enough that her own communicator was going to have feedback from it. I didn't answer her straight away, as my mind first jumped to instructing all of my pack to their stations, as we didn't have a moment to lose. "Mila?!"

"It's a Code Red-Red Ally, that means that the Battlecruisers are moving towards Pandora" I finally found the time to explain things to her once I had sent the majority of our pack scrambling around the ship, with only Matthias, Blaire and Katra remaining in the bridge to enact their roles as lead communicators. "The war is here"

There was a momentary lapse of concentration in her eyes, a little bit disgruntled with the news that it was coming after all, but she soon seemed to throw out that hesitation. Her and I, we shared a momentary connection in each other’s eyes, seeing the unpleasant realisation there. We knew that we were going to lose a lot of people, and we didn't like it one bit... But at the very least, things were going to be over soon, one way or another.

"I'm glad that we're going to be having backup in this fight" She showed a softer side of her, something that Matthias had no doubt seen more intimately himself in the past, as his mind seemed to find some familiarity in the way she was looking at me. "At the very least, I know someone will be giving them as much hell as we will be here on the surface"

I bit back the urge to inform her that I didn't really like her casual use of the term of hell, but I did so with the understanding that she wasn't saying it to poke fun at any sort of religious meaning. To her, it was nothing more than emphasizing just how hard she would be fighting, and I could completely get behind that sentiment.

"Let's give it everything we've got" I gave her my best winning grin, which she easily gave back with her sharp canines gleaming in a war ready smile along.

"Fuck yeah" Despite her somewhat vulgar use of words (something that she had no doubt picked up while being on Pandora, which did have a more no-nonsense attitude to it than most other planets in our solar system), I could hear the determination and purpose behind it all. In more ways than one, she truly was a diamond in the rough; something that could be easily noticed of her if anyone truly spent any time with her.

With that, I decided that the both of us girls could better use our time to doing exactly as we had claimed, ending the communication. I gestured to Katra to hand me the speaker that could connect me to everyone in the ship, in order to give all of our followers a burst of inspiration for the coming fight. At best, my words were going to be nothing more than a trumpet blast leading us into the battle, and at worst, it was going to be a fitting eulogy.

"Here you go darling, I've also turned off the sirens in all parts of the ship" Katra happily held out the device to me, and I took it gratefully from her stylish hand, as it still looked as perfectly manicured and colourful as it had ever been. "After all, everyone's likely awake, even if they weren't before it went off"

"Make it a brilliant one" Blaire also gave me her blessing, her hands hovering over the controls that were going to soon give people the all clear to move the ship. I gave her a small signal within my mind that it was alright for the ship to be moving steadily in that direction, but not quite charging off at full speed.

"Members of The Prevention of Widespread Chaos, this is your leader Mila speaking" I started with the simple part of explaining who I was, despite it being quite clear to everyone there. My voice and mannerisms were well known, but that didn't dispel the slight jitters that made me want to start with something basic before I truly went into it. I could even feel the slight tremble that was present in my hands, but the warm smiles of both strong women in front of me spurred me on to finally find those words. "Today's the day. I know it's been a long road, but we're finally doing people proud. Not just for anyone that we may have lost in the past to these abhorrent people, but for those we're leaving behind and _especially_ for those that will come after us"

Matthias was beaming at me, coming to rest beside me. Even though it was clear that weren't alone in the bridge (in terms of the three of my pack members at least), it felt like I had that privacy if I needed to take a breath for a moment.

"We're not only here to fight for those that have been mistreated by this group, we are also here to ensure that our own solar system will have peace, that the children of the future may be able to live in a world were all people can be friends... Regardless of blood, skin colour, sexuality, gender or class type" After that, it truly became easy to speak those words, as they were things I held dear to my heart. We were all here for a reason, and we were going to do it well. "Without further ado, let's go remind these enemies of ours that we are a force to be reckoned with. Let's go win a war"

The moment I returned the speaker to Katra, there was a chorus of cheering breaking out through the ship. Not just within the bridge (while admittedly, those crew members managed to be the loudest considering their proximity to me), as I could once again hear the noises echoing throughout the ship that told me just how ready everyone truly was. With a flourish in his movements, Matthias even graced me by bowing in respect for the respect and honour that I could manage to command within those people.

"Marvellously done" He was still beaming at me, the pride welling up within his chest being easily conveyed in our pack link. While I could have spent an eternity with those feelings to reinforce every fibre of my being, his sweeping gesture to all of the waiting crew members in the bridge reminded me that they were waiting on my orders. "Anything else to add?"

"Full speed ahead" I pointed off in the direction of the desert planet, which we just could spy in the distance from that location in our atmosphere. With the ship roaring into life underneath our very feet, the ship charged off in pursuit of our enemies.


	2. In Space; Triggering the Battle

The view of Pandora was astounding, looking at least five times as large as Alfu had ever looked to me. But even as I was in awe of the bright orange hues and differing zones on that planet, the five battlecruisers slowly ambling their way toward it seemed to be impossible to miss. It was like looking at some ants coming along to ruin a picnic, but unfortunately this wasn't as simple as squashing them like it would be in that analogy.

"We still are successfully cloaked sir" One of the main coordinators in the cabin, Sam, reported that we were still operating at the correct setting. It seemed unlikely that the Alpha army had put effort into detecting cloaked units, instead putting all of their effort into the massive guns attached to their ships. "There are no changes or alterations to their courses, so it would appear that we haven't been spotted"

While my task wasn't to stand around and give orders in the coordination center, I still found myself lingering for a moment longer to look out of the reinforced windows to have a look at what we were up against. One of the five battlecruisers seemed to be lingering behind, moving at a slower pace than the others, and my attention zeroed in on that one. Like most predators, the sickly or the weak would be one of the first to be picked off in a group of herbivores, so I soon clued in Matthias by gesturing at it.

"The away team will be handling the straggler at the back first. If it's moving slow, then it might be because it is overloaded with weapons or explosives; which are better to be disintegrated in the vacuum of space rather than being deployed on the planet" I explained, Matthias agreeing in our mental pack link that it was a good strategy to pick them off however we could. At the very least, we wanted to have the minimum of two battlecruisers handled, as that would help the massive fourty billion strong army down on Pandora a lot. "I must admit, I'm a little worried about that cruiser with the two massive guns"

"Hmm, it is a cause for concern, isn't it?" Matthias mumbled, scratching his bear as he was estimating whether it was better to leave that one alone and go for another ship while we had the element of surprise. "...As much as it does feel like poking a bear with a stick, it might be better for our fighters to handle it while you are leading the away team to that other ship. It's not an anti-air or anti-space cannon, it seems to be built for handling vast swaths of troops, so it would be devastating to let it reach the surface"

"Not to mention it might just turn it's guns over to the Helicarrier if we ignore it" I gave my overriding expertise on the situation, as losing several fighters was going to be pittance compared to the entire Helicarrier if it managed to break through our reinforced plating and our triple entangled shielding. "Don't forget to allocate the power from the cloaking over to the shields, us being hidden isn't going to matter much if they get a lucky shot in our direction"

"Already have that queued up after the first shot is fired" Katra informed me, as she was in charge of sending the orders to the cloaking engines at the very front of our Helicarrier. While we had the majority of our forty million remaining troops as engineers throughout the ship (with Corey and Trent leading them as best as they could with what needed their attention the most), that didn't mean that we could just take several massive hits in a row without feeling it after a while. "Mila, are you still connected to Blaire's communication network?"

"She most certainly is" Blaire tested my earpiece one final time, before handing it over to me. That way, no matter where I was, I would still be able to allocate orders if there was something that needed my Omega mind. "Keep everyone in the away team safe, alright?"

"I can only promise to do my best" It kind of hurt to say that, but I knew that promising that nobody in my team would come to harm was impossible. This war would have casualties, and making that sort of call would be exceedingly cruel to not only Katra, Matthias and Blaire, but to any other common foot-soldier who would not have the luxury of being within arm’s reach of me. "We'll be back after the first battlecruiser and see how we go from there"

Matthias gave me a quick salute as I left the bridge, before I began moving through the various corridors toward the main hangar. The majority of troops were waiting anxiously, which meant that it was relatively easy to slip in between them and their fighters to reach the waiting Banshee and Valkyrie. All of my pack was there, sans our two engineers Trent and Corey as well as the three people on the bridge, so there were only thirteen people there compared to the eighteen fellow pack members I was used to. 

"We're going to be slipping out with the first wave of fighters, before diverging over toward the battlecruiser that is lagging behind the others" I was all business with them at the time, as there was no time for last goodbyes and well wishes. Any kind of diversion was too costly a move to make... But at the very least, they could feel my emotions reflect how reassured I was to have them by my side. "Paul, Marvin, are the ships prepared?"

"More than ready, the shielding and cloaking have been triple checked, and we're armed to the teeth" Marvin was the one to deliver that list of information, patting the latter of the two ships to signify which one he was going to be piloting. There were times when I wondered whether having his wife and kids back at home on Alfu was a help or a hindrance to how he handled himself, but now was not the time to distract him with such a question. "In order to make our ships move faster, Tanner and Kevin are acting as support units in their own two ships there, while everyone else will be split between the Valkyrie and the Banshee"

I quickly probed their minds to see if they had sorted out who was going to be within which ship, and to my everlasting gratitude it seemed to have been something that they had sorted out a long time ago. Jfred, Bryan, Malaki, Sera and Mayu were going to be travelling with Marvin, while Amanda, Connor, Gunner, Bobby and I would be flying with Paul.

As we began to clamber into our different ships, we could feel the ship judder and shake suddenly, booming several shots out against our opponents with our own weaponry. Looking out through the shielded hangar doors, our entire away team could see that our cloaking had been dropped, but the enemy hadn't quite figured out where they were getting attacked from.

 **"All personnel, the first wave of fighters are commanded to launch. I repeat; the first wave of fighters are commanded to launch"** Another person in our communication centre sent out the all clear for the troops, which meant that we were going to be launching as well. Not long after the announcement had been made, the veritable thrumming of engines starting and hovering in that hanger could be felt even through the sturdy floor of the Banshee; which only got taken over when our very own ship fluttered into life.

"Cloaking is activated, and the other fighters have been notified of our location via their sonar. We shouldn't have to worry about being hit by accident by them" Paul rattled off that piece of information, partly to reassure himself by gabbing on about his favourite past time, and to make sure that I was being kept up to speed. While I certainly could just have prodded within his mind to find the information that I needed, it was often faster to just hear it repeated back to me. I was the only one remaining standing, as the other four in our ship had buckled into the seats in the back, but I needed to see everything that was going on to keep up with everything. "Valkyrie and our two accompanying Vikings are cloaked as well. The hangar shielding is coming down in three... Two..."

At the final count, the bright purple shield keeping our fighters contained dissipated, and I already managed to prepare myself before the ships all charged out. As we came out of the hanger, it almost felt like we were being swarmed by an entire flock of brightly coloured birds, the absolute majority of them already swerving and moving in odd ways to confuse the opponents before we could be fired upon.

It was only when we were fully out into space that the flock of fighters diverged away from our away team, sharply veering to the right to fire upon the battlecruiser with the massive guns. It took that battlecruiser a moment to even realise that it was being besieged by millions of fighters, before one of its two guns and fired a pot-shot at one closely clustered group of fighters.

Despite the vacuum of space swallowing the majority of sound from the ensuing explosion, the massive fireball that came from the collective engines of the fighters showed quite vividly on how much damage they had sustained... Which only got further exacerbated when I started to hear chatter from the bridge.

"We have lost life signs for the following troops; Woods, Eric, Robert, Richie and Whitney" Blaire announced the first lot of lost lives, and I tried my best to not let those names affect me. I... I knew those names too well, as eighteen years had certainly given me enough time to recognise them all. Another massive gunshot later, and it seemed as if we had lost a number more fighters, even as our cloaked ships turned to the left to head for our own associated battlecruiser. "We have lost life signs for the following troops; Heather, Kyle, Patrick-

"Only announce the life signs for the higher up units" Matthias quickly put a stop to Blaire announcing every single death that was going to happen, as he could easily tell just how demoralizing it would be to constantly have those announcements in our troops ears. I silently thanked him for that decision, before letting my mind slot back to focusing on the battle raging on around us.

From what I could see out of the secondary view ports in the Banshee, the Alpha had skimped a bit on hardware with their guns. The battlecruiser that was handing out shots against our troops was only doing so with a single gun, as the other one seemed to be stuck at only twisting around in a semi-circle on the other side of it, which meant that there was going to be significantly less loss of life if we could manage to remove that one gun for the time being.

"Tanner, Kevin, I need the both of you to diverge over to the fighters on the battlecruiser at our five o'clock" I directed them to assist our troops, as our entire army was going to have a difficult time if we lost the majority of our fighters to some stupid gun. Both of their Viking's sharply pulled off a manoeuvre to head that way, obeying my command long before I had even told them the reason why; as they knew I wouldn't command it of them if I had no good reason. "Take out the main gun firing upon our first wave, as your weapons pack more punch than the fighters do"

"Yes ma'am" Tanner acknowledged the order, the both of their ships just barely visible in our radar because of their cloaking still being activated. Their help would be invaluable to the fighters going against that ship, as not only would it protect against the countless deaths from the explosions and gunfire, but it would dramatically raise the morale of those troops once their task was no longer a suicide mission. "Launching a black star missile set! All fighters, clear the area!"

The black star missile set was one of the strongest in our arsenal, but it did often spread out into a veritable shower of damage. While it was certainly strong against a shield covering a ship, it did mean that the chances of hitting our fellow troops were quite high. Kevin also followed along in the fighters’ movement, instead choosing to assist in firing upon different parts of the ship while Tanner did his damage.

The fired missile split into twenty different brightly coloured missile shards, raining upon the shield covering the target; which begun to flow, ebb and crackle as it strained to keep itself together under the assault. Unfortunately, the person who was aiming the gun was not as stupid as the majority of Alpha could be - as it found the sudden lack of fighters in an area combined with a missile coming out of nowhere - completely suspicious. It fired upon that empty area, and seemed to be get lucky, as soon after we could hear the strangled cry coming Tanner's communication device.

"I've been hit!" His statement got further backed up by the fact that his Viking could no longer handle keeping itself cloaked the entire time, coming into view and showing that it had been hit directly in one of its vitally important wings, a hole even appearing in the side of his ship that threatened to tear Tanner out by the sudden differing pressure in the cockpit. "Grrh!"

Paul glanced over at me worriedly as he could hear his best friend struggling over the communicator to grab his spare Oz kit (a device which provides a small bubble of oxygen, often used only in emergencies or in low oxygen environments), but I could only grimace back. I couldn't order us to turn around to go help him, as not only were we far too far away to even be in a position to help him in time, but the current mission of handling the straggling battlecruiser couldn't just be cancelled to save the life of a single man. Luckily I didn't have to deal with rowdy members of my pack angrily claiming that we had to go back for him, as they knew this as well, but I could feel the encroaching worry and dismay seep into their minds... As the realisation that we were going to lose a pack member was never going to feel like anything beyond heart wrenching despair.

"Evasive manoeuvres Tanner, evasive manoeuvres!" Kevin hurriedly called over his own communicator, his ship sharply turning around and weaving through several different fighter squadrons to try and reach his fellow pack member in time. But both his and Tanner's ships were Vikings, which were both built for heavy weaponry... Not speed or quick shifts in movement; meaning that both Kevin reaching him in time and Tanner shifting out of the way were both impossible to pull off. "I've nearly reached you, you'll make it!"

If the final grumble coming over the communicator was anything to go by, it seemed that Tanner steeled his mind for the realisation that struggling any further with his Oz kit was going to end up fruitless anyway. With the little air he had left, we could see that he sharply directed his rickety ship to charge in the direction of the gun, even though his sharp angle meant that he wouldn't be able to pull up his ship in time... This seemed to be exactly what he was aiming for.

"TANNER!!" It seemed as if the one who was the closest to him, Kevin, was the most horrified by the sudden realisation, and his horrified scream only seemed to ripple through everyone who heard him.

With a violent explosion from the remaining weaponry and missiles still on board his ship, the Viking violently slammed into the last bits of the shield remaining over that particular gun. It shattered the remaining bits of shield and sent out a heavy shock-wave through not only the heavy machinery of that weapon, but through all of the other fighters who had returned to try and help their superior officer. With the gun momentarily disabled, we could hear the voice of Blaire breaking through the communication lines again.

"Tanner... Tanner's life signs have flat-lined" She spelled out the news that the rest of us on the front lines had already surmised, but I could feel my heart lurch as I heard the slight squeak of someone leaning in their chair. It undoubtedly was Katra who was sitting beside her, wanting to see for herself whether Blaire was telling the truth... Only to realise that it was, her sitting back down in her chair with a slump. "Katra..."

"I'm fine" She most certainly was not fine, her voice told that loud and clear. But at the very least, the immediate thought of revenge seemed to shove that feeling of despair, which kept her together for the time being. "Let's _get_ them"

Back on the front lines, the missing shield and momentary lack of movement from the gun prompted a veritable wave of attack to come from the fighters and Kevin, the entire lot of them firing upon it with gusto to see the blasted construct shatter into a millions pieces. I could even see Kevin launch his own black star missile set (while of course still being careful to not hit his fellow troops), which finally seemed to do the trick, violently destroying the gun that had taken out so many of their friends.

"Kevin, how goes the possibility of returning to us?" I tested to see whether the final remaining Viking flyer could return to our side unscathed, but it seemed as if that was not going to be so simple to pull off.

"...Negative; there are several enemy troops coming out of this battlecruiser now that they realise that they can't keep firing at us with their big guns" Kevin filled me in perfectly, which meant that I could paint a mental picture of the battlefield without even having to be present. Even better, it meant that I could turn my eyes away from the secondary view ports, instead looking ahead of our Banshee to our own target. "They look like helicopters and such, but even though they aren't built for space they might soon become a problem if I don't stick around to take care of them"

Kevin not only felt like he had to now finish what Tanner had started (i.e. protect the fellow fighters on the battlefield) but he also likely would attract unwanted attention to himself if he turned around and tried to re-join us. As much as it meant that Marvin and Paul would have to pull off some better flying in his absence, it did sound like it was better for Kevin to stay there.

"Alright, fly well" I gave him the alright to remain there, hoping that the Alpha battlecruiser couldn't turn itself around so fast and use its other gun. I didn't want to have to hear about several people sacrificing themselves in such a manner, as it sounded like someone throwing themselves at a brick wall in the hopes that it would shatter for those behind them; it felt like needless death and bloodshed to me.

"Mila, we have enemy troops coming out of the battlecruiser ahead of us" Marvin announced the approaching swarm of helicopters, them all looking very wobbly and inefficient in the vacuum of space compared to the typical oxygen they worked in. Even so, the mini-guns attached to several of them weren't something to casually sneeze at, so I communicated mentally to Paul to send out a warning to all of our fellow troopers to be wary of the incoming wave of enemies. "My scanning of them says that they don't have any kind of cloaking or infiltration detecting equipment, so what would you like us to do?"

"Carefully weave through them. As much as I would like to say that Paul and you would be able to fly rings around them, we'd be hopelessly outmatched in our current capacity" I gave that instruction at just the right time, as Paul began to carefully find gaps in between the helicopters to avoid giving away that we were essentially swimming through their wave of troops. If the slight shimmer at our side was anything to go by, then Marvin was also doing an admirable job at swerving around the enemy troops. Paul's sonar gave an estimation of us going through a lot of ten millions helicopters, which prompted me to specifically order Matthias to do something. "Matt, feel free to fire upon our enemies coming from your ten o'clock; you won't be experiencing any fire coming from the battlecruiser with the massive guns right now"

His response didn't come in the form of verbal words, instead the accompaniment of guns firing and helicopters exploding behind us served to make me aware that he had heard me correctly. By that point we were clear of the helicopters, and only a very short distance from the open hanger of the bloated battlecruiser. Even so, the punch of our own guns felt reassuring, leaving me to other tasks.

I wondered what on Alfu the other three battlecruisers were up to, as we had yet to deal with any sort of payback from them. When I borrowed one of Paul's spare screens on his dashboard, I specifically looked for them, and I wasn't that surprised to see that two of the battlecruisers were heading directly for the planet despite the battle going on. After all, they had planned for a fight to be happening on the ground, not being ambushed by behind; so the more cowardly of their kind were struggling to end up reaching exactly what they had been aiming for. While I clicked my tongue in annoyance at the realisation that we couldn't handle all five battlecruisers before they reached our comrades on Pandora, I quickly searched for the final one that I hadn't found earlier.

I found it lingering somewhere in between the two battlecruisers that we were dishing out damage towards, but I was confused on why it seemed to be doing nothing more than just remaining stationary in space. Just a moment after I was going to ask Matthias for what he thought that the third battlecruiser was doing, it seemed to pulse, sending out a large wave of electric energy.

"Brace yourselves!" I managed to send that last message on all wavelengths, but there likely wasn't much that people could do on such short notice. When the electric energy passed over our Banshee, it seemed to play havoc with all of the main functions of the ships, it struggling to keep the shielding, cloaking and everything else running as normal.

"Diverting all power to the main functions of the ship!" Paul called that out, quickly flicking a number of switches so that the Banshee wouldn't attempt to prioritise the cloaking over the life support. Our upgraded communication vectors seemed to handle the energy like it was a simple breeze, as a moment later I could hear Marvin call out that he was doing a similar thing in his ship to try and keep the Valkyrie running.

"The Helicarrier is alright" Matthias managed to convey that as well, as of course Corey and Trent had ensure that our engineers had upgraded it with shielding and protective equipment that was resistant to any sort of electric interference (the former had even snorted in contempt when we had joked that it would happen, as he had always said that it would be exceedingly embarrassing to die from the element that he knew the most about). "Our fighters are momentarily restarting, but it seemed to have messed with some of their helicopters as well"

"Dang it!!" Unfortunately, it seemed that the electric pulse _did_ have one particular casualty, as Kevin shouted through the communicator. If the frantic sound of him flipping switches was anything to go by, then he had not managed to divert the power fast enough, and his Viking was sitting without power in the middle of the battlefield. "No! Come on, come on! NO!-

His communication got cut short by an almighty screech, something that I recognised a little too well as the sound of metal being ripped apart by gunfire. Even though our simulations had always told us that Viking's could never survive a frontal assault that well, I was hoping that I had mistaken in recognising that noise.

"...Kevin's life signs have flat-lined"

...But it seemed that hope wasn't enough. After hearing a momentary cry of disbelief from Bryan, followed by the sound of Marvin punching the side of his seat, we had to return to the task at hand.

"We have bad news; the dropped cloaking has drawn come of the attention of troops behind us" Paul returned everyone back to business, as he had managed to restart his sonar fast enough to see some of the troops making their way after us now that we were uncloaked. "Marvin, we're going to have to make this a fast drop off and then lead some of these guys on a wild-goose chase"

"Oh, I'll give them more than _just_ a goose chase" Marvin was still raring to go, his Valkyrie back up to speed at about the same time as Paul had gotten the Banshee back to its former glory. With their power now no longer being directed to the cloaking and instead being mainly put into the main thrusters to give them both improved speed, the ten of us who were going to be dropped off started to prepare our weapons in order to board the ship.


	3. In Space; Within the Hornet's Nest

With Connor, Bobby, Gunner and Amanda flanking me, it felt almost like old times. It felt very close to the very first flight we had experienced as a group, eighteen years ago when we were heading to the Isles of Centica. The only difference now was he addition of Amanda, and... The one missing member of those five men who had come with me.

"Sonar says that there is a horde of people still in the hangar" Paul's report snapped me back out of the momentary trip down into the past, as I had better time to mourn Tanner's death after the fighting was completed. Whether it would be in the comfort of Paul's embrace or within the light of heaven... Peace would eventually come. "Fly by drop in five, four, three, two..."

On the final count, Paul's Banshee stormed through the shielding in the hangar and flung open the doors on the Banshee at the very same time, the five of us waiting at the back leaping out the moment we could register the light of the hangar. The moment Paul could hear our boots (and heel) thudding into the metal of the hangar, his Banshee tore off back out into the vacuum of space, firing at a number of helicopters before sharply veering around the battlecruiser. With the Valkyrie joining him in attracting the attention of those enemy troops, I knew that the five other units had been dropped successfully.

"We've been boarded! Call for-GUGH!" One Alpha seemed to register that we weren't some of his allies returning, but he got cut off by Bryan firing a rifle shot into his neck, causing him to gargle on his blood before he could finish his instructions to the others. With Jfred taking only a moment longer to start the minigun within his hands, our group converged behind him (and joined in) as his swath of destruction took out half of the still gathered enemies in the hangar, painting the mute grey walls in a mist of red. Furthermore, the gunfire from us ensured that no other helicopters still stationed there could be used, not unless the pilots of those damaged ships wanted to lose all of their air in a split second.

" _The portable scanner device hasn't searched the entirety of the ship yet, but there is an open door on our two o'clock"_ Gunner reported that to me silently, as of course we didn't want our opponents to hear what we were planning. The device in his hands clearly told us which doors would require some sort of lock to get past, so the path of least resistance was always the better one to aim for if there were multiple choices; just like water would do when flash flooding a ravine. " _Currently the best bet for overloading the engines, based on our reports on the battlecruisers we scanned on Alfu, are to head to the main controls and mess with them there. We can go directly to the engine room, but we'll likely blow up the battlecruiser while we're still in it"_

I mentally agreed with the plan, as the latter option only sounded like something we would do if the bridge was completely inaccessible. While taking out a battlecruiser in exchange for a measly ten troops sounded like a steal, it would be even better if we managed to accomplish it with less loss of life.

After Gunner and I had settled that between us, I joined in with helping the other eight members of our team in getting rid of the troops that would be immediately in our way. Jfred's minigun had run out of ammo, as while it was devastating it was also bulky and ineffective to use it beyond a single clip. As he threw it directly into the face of one of the Alpha charging at our semi-circle of people, I instructed Malaki to throw Bobby and I.

Malaki picked the both of us up like we were feathers to him, flinging us both high into the air above of our opponents. Not only did it serve to make a number of them stare up in confusion as to what we were doing, but it gave me enough velocity to unclip the outer layer of my electrically charged skirt, giving me several metal pylons that had previously been doing not much more than acting as decoration. Quickly flipping a small switch located on each one, I passed them to Bobby who then threw them in the shape of a hexagon around a particularly big cluster of enemy Alpha. Once the pylons were all organized around them, they flared into life and electrocuted those who were within them, taking them out. Just before Bobby and I could land in a mess in between several opponents, he managed to grab onto me and throw a portable bounce pad (one of Trent's pride and joy, might I mention), which expanded at just the right time to fling the both of us right back towards our allies, with Jfred using his now open arms to catch us.

 _"Hell yeah!"_ Connor was not only cheering for the sheer fact that the both of us had managed to pull off such a trick, but it could only have been accomplished because of his invention of my electric skirt. No matter how crazy an idea I came up with, Connor always seemed to have a way to implement it in real life, making several impossible ideas flourish into a deadly dance.

 _"That's enough opponents for now, we have a clear opening to get to the door that Gunner was mentioning"_ I made the call that we had taken out enough Alpha, as I could also spy that some of the leftover Alpha were starting to go for the abandoned minigun in the middle of the hangar. Unfortunately for them, we weren't really keen on sharing; as Bryan, Connor and I had come up with the simple plan of making all of our weapons fingerprint locked in a manner. Most enemies would make use of stealing enemy weapons during the heat of battle, so it was quite simple to implement a small lock that only had our pack members as proper registers who could unlock it. Use a fingerprint that the weapon didn't recognise, and...

 ** _BOOM!_** The minigun soon beeped a negative noise because of the enemy Alpha that had picked it up, exploding violently in his face when he brought it up to see what on Alfu it was complaining about. Using the ensuing shrapnel and confusion to our advantage, our group quickly charged off towards the unlocked door. With Jfred dropping off his cousin (but continuing to carry me to increase our pack's collective speed), Gunner led the way for us because of the device still being located in his hands.

 _"The rest of the ship is constructed with long hallways in mind, as they built to withstand several different parts of the ship losing power or air"_ Mayu explained that the moment we entered into the long white hallways of the internal structure, with several doors and little rooms built into the sides to house the massive amount of people on the ship. Luckily for us, the attack had caused all of the Alpha to gather into different important parts of the ship rather than idly linger around in their bunk beds or rooms, so dealing with hordes of Alpha coming out of their rooms seemed to be an impossibility. She glanced over at her husband's hands, carefully inspecting the holographic map that was lit up from his palm. _"According to Gunner's map, at the intersection ahead we will have two locked doors; one ahead and one to our right. Only the left door seems to be unlocked"_

 _"What does the left door lead to?"_ I asked, but I had a strong feeling that I knew where it was heading. If going towards our right meant reaching the bridge, then it was likely that left meant towards the engines themselves. Leaving such a door open sounded odd, which made me highly suspicious of what was going to be there.

 _"According to the scanner, there's a big group of Alpha lying in wait there. They're expecting us to storm the engine room"_ What Gunner said made sense, as the engine was closer and a more certain way of destroying the entire battlecruiser, so naturally the Alpha would have been expecting us to head that way. Without even needing me to ask, Gunner could tell once we reached that intersection that I was interested in the other directions, looking over at the right door with a particular interest. _"Breaking through the locked door will take much longer than we expect, considering the reinforced doors to protect against catastrophic failure like Mayu mentioned. It might be... Five minutes?"_

 _"Five minutes is too long"_ Sera wasn't as optimistic as she usually would have been, as naturally this was not exactly a good position to be in. Not only would the time be quite long, the noise we would make would tip off the horde of Alpha waiting on our left _as well as_ leave us open to attack from the Alpha coming from the hangar. _"Connor, do you have any sort of explosives?"_

 _"These doors are blast resistant; so anything that would actually make a proper dent would more likely damage us from the shockwave. There are also no electronic panels here for us to mess with, so it's likely operated either by the bridge or by some kind of infrared biological scan"_ Connor disagreed, as using a heavy bomb would only destroy our internal organs, and an electronic method would be out even if we did have Matthias, Corey and/or Trent. But even though he was denying it, he could read my mind that the right door was better for us (going the other way was suicide as it was without the extra Alpha in our way), so he started to go towards it with a heavy electronic crowbar being pulled from his equipment bag. _"Jfred, Malaki, the both of you help me over here"_

Connor tried his best to jam the crowbar into the middle of the door, but it didn't seem to find a crack just yet. What it did do was make an incredibly loud banging noise, which made me glance over to Gunner quickly as I was being put down by the youngest Frederick brother. Gunner shook his head, meaning that the Alpha waiting for us in the opposite direction hadn't found the noise suspicious enough to investigate, but it was likely only a matter of time before that mind-set would change.

" _Sera, Mayu and Amanda, act as guards over the way we just came; I want an early warning in case some of those Alpha decide to come after us"_ I ordered the three women to stand guard over the passageway, as the probability of shortly getting some Alpha who were revenge hungry was high. But as I was about to order Bobby and Bryan to guard the other direction, I found myself realising that it was not going to be so simple. Not only would the Alpha coming from the engine direction have a direct line of sight on the majority of us, but they would also be in such a vast number that two measly guards would not be able to mitigate their damage enough. And betting on the chance that they wouldn't hear us struggling with a door for five minutes was...

 _Bang!_ Connor put far more oomph into his second swing, finally finding some kind of crevice in the doors for his crowbar. When he supplied quite a bit of his muscle against the tool, the metal began to screech violently as if verbally protesting him trying to open it. Just as there was enough space for some fingers to fit there, Jfred and Malaki fumbled a little bit to find enough handholds around each other’s fingers and the original tool, before also applying their collective power onto the door.

 _"Mila"_ I could feel the worry dripping off Gunner long before he mentally called my name, and it wasn't that surprising to see on his map that the engine Alpha were starting to creep forward towards us. Whether they knew what we were doing and were trying to catch us by surprise, or it was simply them being curious on what was taking us so long, we were soon going to be dealing with a bunch of problems that we didn't need.

Both Alpha comrades pulling against the door seemed to try and apply more pressure the moment they realised we were running out of time, but it was as though the entire ship was working against them. We could even hear the extra thrumming and struggling of the engines from where we were; the doors were not only triple reinforced and blast resistant, but they also seemed to have extra power flowing to them to try and shove them shut. Gunner's estimation of five minutes certainly seemed to be true, and we were only about a minute or two into the operation.

Realising that there wasn't any other option within my mind, I started to weigh up the differences in who I was going to have to order to distract the Alpha coming from the engine room. Frankly any of the Beta could have acted as some fodder to take the heat off us, but they likely wouldn't have lasted long enough if I told them to go, no matter how hard they might try to do so. With two of our Alpha still struggling with the doors (and I had the sneaking suspicion that they would have to start over if I insisted on swapping one of them anyway), that only left a single Alpha to choose from.

Bryan soon noticed that I was looking at him far longer than a cursory glance, which caught his attention. When he searched my mind to figure out what I was thinking, he soon found the plan bouncing around in my head, and he too realised that there was no other person who could make the situation work in the way that I wanted it to. He wasn't exactly thrilled about it... But it didn't him that long to take a deep breath in and accept what I was essentially proposing to him.

"Take care of Marvin for me" He could have thought that, but it seemed as if he was momentarily worried that his mind would not convey it in _quite_ the right way that he wanted it to. And while I knew that I couldn't exactly promise him that - just like I couldn't keep such a promise to Blaire - I found that my head was nodding anyway, perhaps as an unconscious part of my personality that loved him enough to want to make him happy in what might have been his final moments. He smiled, one tinged with a familiar sense of somber that I could feel in my own heart by sending him to his doom, before he charged across the intersection.

He seemed to have gone at just the right moment, as the door down in the direction of the engine opened right as he reached it. The Alpha coming our way were taken by surprise to see someone charging right at them, which Bryan used to his advantage by barrelling his shoulder into the first lot of them; acting like he was the bowling ball into a set of pins. The moment the door shut a barrage of oddly timed shots seemed to be fired, likely from the Alpha hurriedly trying to fight back against him and failing utterly at being in time with each other. While there certainly was accompanying noises that reminded me of blood splattering over walls and bodies crumpling to the ground, we still didn't exactly hear an announcement from Blaire that we had lost Bryan yet, so perhaps... Perhaps there was hope.

With the other members of our pack realising what Bryan was doing, Jfred and Malaki seemed to put extra effort into their door destroying mannerisms. Even if the door wasn't shrieking and creaking, the obvious strain was being put onto our two remaining Alpha, with their fingers turning a ghostly white and their teeth were violently grinding against one another. In that split second we could see the canines within their mouth well, reflecting both our wolfish ancestry and the deadly nature of the Alpha in equal mannerisms. But even though we were all fighting Alpha in that moment, it felt reassuring to have that sort of deadly nature on our side.

" _We have enough space to get the majority of our pack through right now, it'll just take the three of us a bit longer to get us Alpha through as well"_ Malaki just barely managed to communicate that as well as keep up his fight with the stubborn piece of metal he was grasping, and I hurriedly urged Gunner to enter so that we could keep planning our progression toward the bridge. After Gunner I sent through Mayu, Sera, Bobby and Amanda, before stalling just a bit longer to see whether Bryan had done such a monumentous job that he could come with us after all.

 _"Bryan, how are you doing?"_ I asked him mentally at first, before receiving no response. In case he was just barely out of range for the mental pack link that we shared, I switched over to the communication vector while clambering through the gap in the door after my other pack members. "Bryan, status report"

"...Agh. One shoulder wound, three chest wounds and five leg wounds" Bryan reported back to me, and I could hear immediately from the pained voice that he was having difficulty in just talking to me. While the leg wounds were likely easily shrugged off by him, I was worried about the ones within his chest. Before he could answer me further, I heard a gunshot through the communication vector, and another pained shout coming from him. "Ow, fuck! Make that two shoulder wounds!"

"Bryan, if you hurry you can make it through the doors" Jfred also joined in with the discussion going on with us, as he had another communication device as well due to being a Commander of the movement. While he and I knew that we couldn't afford to dawdle and sacrifice others for people within our pack (that would just be patently unfair for the other sixty million in our movement after all), there was a part of him that didn't want to give up on his brother in law.

"Negative. The five leg wounds are in the same leg, and I'm currently in no position to be returning to you guys without getting my head blown off" Bryan told us this, before we could hear the sound of him firing his rifle for a brief moment to get the Alpha to leave him alone for a second. "I'm serious; I'm using a pile of dead corpses for cover right now. I can't make it back without leading around... Half of the remaining Alpha back to you guys"

...And considering the fact that Jfred, Malaki and Connor weren't past the doors yet, that was a bad idea. With a grimace, I ordered the three men to come through the pried open doors without Bryan, before giving a Morse-code signal (via taps on the communication device) to our left behind Alpha that we were going on ahead. A couple of seconds passed by, but eventually we received back the simple letters of O and K from Bryan's device.

It almost seemed like Jfred was considering not coming through the door, as he was the final Alpha to come through after Malaki and Connor slipped through, but eventually he had no choice but to growl in regret and join us. The moment the three of them let go the door violently slammed itself shut, the power still doing its best to keep several parts of the ship separate from one another.

" _We've got more options up ahead of us, and the majority of them seem to be heading towards the bridge"_ Gunner did have good news to report his time, showing me his map to show that because of our diverging path, we had avoided more locked doors. Not only that, but we wouldn't have to worry about the Alpha hanging around the ship until we reached the bridge, as the majority of Alpha were swarming over towards the engine to protect it like little hornets protecting their queen... Which was good, as we weren't aiming for the queen. If anything, we were going to be using a flamethrower on the hive.

 _"Lead the way"_ I urged the nine of us to proceed despite the missing member of our group, as the less time spent on that battlecruiser, the better. While Gunner led us, with our two Alpha being right behind him in case we accidentally stumbled into a wandering group of enemies, I switched my communication device to all frequencies so that I could get an idea of what was happening on the battlefield without us.

"Sir, the battlecruiser seems to be in the middle of its rotation" I tuned in just in time to listen to one of our fighter pilots giving a report to Matthias, the latter of which being blissfully unaware of what was happening to Bryan. After all, he didn't have time to be worrying about what we were doing inside the bloated battlecruiser, and Blaire wouldn't dare distract him even if Bryan did have odd vital signs. "Furthermore, it looks like the helicopters are leaving behind debris that it is getting in the way of movement for most of us"

"Launch the second wave of fighters early in that case" Matthias made a call that I agreed with, as releasing more troops would help to clear the battlefield before that darned battlecruiser could fully flip around and fire on people. While it might have meant more short term deaths, in the long run it was going to help the cause far more than holding back entirely would. "How are Paul and Marvin holding up?"

"Sonar says that they are still currently flying around sir, so it would appear that they are handling the flight alright for now. They are swarmed by a number of helicopters, but they're working as a team"

I released a breath that I didn't realise I was holding. The moment that question came from Matthias there was of course the worry that either pilot was in a spot of trouble, as losing them would be far more catastrophic than just losing my life partner and the younger Valle brother that I had just promised to keep alive, because then we would have to think of how to escape the battlecruiser some other way.

 _"Mila, there are a couple of escape pods on our left right now"_ Sera pointed both literally and figuratively out the round pods to our left, something that began to twist it's way into another plan. Returning to the hangar was likely going to be difficult once we had accomplished our tasks, so ejecting ourselves in escape pods to be picked up individually by Paul and Marvin sounded like it could possibly work. And if we released a number at once, then the opponents would equally have to judge which one they attacked (after all, for all they knew, all of them were filled to the brim with nothing more than their allies). Sera grinned, pleased to feel that she had contributed to helping another one of my grandiose plans, pumping her fist only a moment later to show her exuberant attitude even in the face of danger. " _Yay! I did a good job!"_

It was possibly ill-timed, but it felt good to hear her say something to bring up our spirits, even if it was only a momentary boost to the rest of us. We still had a lot to do, and I was already feeling the hefty weight on my shoulders; something that always come when leading people in such a horrific war.


	4. In Space; Heavenly Cleansing Flames

The Alpha within that battlecruiser truly were all retreating back to their engines, scurrying like the cockroaches that they were. They hadn't planned on being ambushed, and it showed entirely in the fact that their defences and countermeasures were pitiful while they were still within space. But hey, I wasn't looking a gift horse in the mouth; I was more than happy to accept their typical lack of planning as an extra bonus.

 _"If we take a right here and ascend our left staircase afterward, then we have a clear shot to the bridge"_ Gunner's scanner had completely mapped out the ship by then, it holographically lighting up from his palm to show everyone the several tunnels and passageways within the ship. We even had a small green indicator on the map that was separated from our current location, the ever so small movements of that indicator spelling out that Bryan was just barely moving around after he had handled his group of Alpha. That renewed the possible hope within my chest, and I started to communicate orders via communication vector to him; instructing him to carefully find his way to the escape pods when he had the time. He wasn't able to respond (whether it was because it would expend too much energy or because he was too distracted, I was unable to tell at the time), so I repeated the set of orders one more time before returning to work.

 _"Don't use any sort of explosive, corrosive or electric weapons, as we don't want to completely bugger the controls before we can use them"_ I instructed my pack right as we encountered the set of stairs that Gunner had told us about, reaching around to my back to retrieve my holy sword. It could cut through any material as long as it was within my hands (or in some other Omega's hands, but Corey or Trent were not there to be able to use it anyway), so it had to be used with care, lest I accidentally swipe it over one of the main controls. _"Split into three groups to protect one another; Malaki, Jfred and I will be the respective leaders. Bobby and Sera with me, Jfred will have Mayu and Connor, and Malaki will take Gunner and Amanda"_

Both Beta pressed tightly to me the moment I ordered them to be assigned to me, with Sera fetching out several of her throwing stars and throwing needles while Bobby picked out his plasma rifle. The rifle frankly was quite old by then, at least eighteen years considering the fact that Bobby had gotten it when we had raided the base on Alfu that had held Corey and Trent prisoner, but they certainly did make those weapons to last.

" _Breaching"_ Jfred gave that single word as a warning, before pulling off the typical move that all Alpha could accomplish, by smashing down the final door that was holding our collective group from the bridge. Compared to the triple reinforced doors in the rest of the ship that had given us so much trouble, this one came flying off like tissue paper, smacking directly into the back of one particularly unfortunate Alpha. _"Five on the right, three on the left, eight in front"_

Using Jfred's hints as to how many people were in the room, I immediately headed for the five people on the right with my two subordinates following behind me. Out of the five that were on the right, only one had a weapon on him, and that immediately got taken out of the equation by Bobby firing a single round into his head. Angling my sword in just the right way above my head, I allowed it to act as a sort of platform for my two pack members to use as a boost, something which Sera gladly took advantage of to jump high into the air. With the remaining four - actually, make that three considering Bobby took another out - staring at Sera flying through the air, she flung her throwing stars and needles with deadly accuracy into the startled eyes of our opponents. The ones who received a needle seemed to die instantly, as those sharp objects could pierce deep enough to make a mess of their brain, but the one single opponent who received a throwing star seemed to be blinded instead because of it bouncing off his face.

Letting Bobby handle the final blind member of that five, I turned my attention to help the group who had diverged over to the eight people in the center. Jfred was confidently handling three of them at once with his more experienced hand to hand combat, and Mayu and Connor were picking off the remaining ones with a beam sword and heavy sledgehammer respectively. One of their eight did make the foolish mistake of attempting to charge over to me, the weakest looking member out of our pack. I found myself snickering a little before letting my sword give him a swift stab through his neck, before decapitating him efficiently. It didn't make for a clean death (both in the literal and figurative sense), but there were few times that my sword could actually do something cleaner.

Gunner and Amanda were doing well as a tag team despite them often not being paired together in the past (they naturally gravitated towards their wife and husband as a habit), but their combination of heavy plasma pistol and sonic whip worked like a charm. The final enemy was felled by Malaki, who had managed to overpower the opposing Alpha and stomp their head akin to a watermelon (I trusted Malaki and Jfred to never lay a finger on anyone who didn't deserve it, but that didn't mean that their monstrous strength wasn't occasionally frightening).

 _"We're alone for now, but that's likely going to change the moment we tamper with the controls"_ Gunner flipped right back into leading us around, taking back out the scanner and letting it light up a holographic map that everyone within our pack could readily read if we needed to. I was upset to note that Bryan had made very little progress in the direction of the escape pods, instead veering a little towards the engines; in the opposite direction from us. Even so, I was hoping that it came down to nothing more than the fact that Bryan couldn't find an open door - or didn't have the strength to break open a locked variant like we had struggled to do - and that he was trying to find some way that involved the path of least resistance like we had been doing.

 _"The other battlecruisers had a design flaw in the controls right over here Mila"_ Mayu directed me over to the main engine control, showing me that something was not quite up to speed. The battlecruiser was really old by then, not being upgraded in a long while because... Well, then the Alpha who stole the ship would have had to explain why they had a stolen ship in their possession. And those dwindling amounts of upgrades meant that our Helicarrier and troops (despite the former not being built for space battle in comparison to our enemies versions), that meant we had a number of advantages... Including this one.

Wordlessly, Mayu brought up the controls for the direction in which the ship was supposed to travel, selecting both 'forwards' and 'backwards' at the very same time with her deft fingers. Most ship computers and processors were smart enough to disengage if they got differing orders from the person guiding the ship, but these battlecruisers had been stolen before that particular bug had been discovered and fixed. As such, all nine of us could feel the sudden lurch of the ship as it tried to keep going forwards, but its own back-thrusters being big enough that the entire construct was effectively doing nothing more than buzzing in place like some demented hummingbird. The only way that ship was going to quit its efforts would be if it got manually told to stop, but we certainly weren't going to tell it that.

 _"This feels worse than a rollercoaster"_ Connor grumbled within his mind, clearly not pleased with the sudden rocking and shaking of the ship we were in. Not only was it annoying enough to deal with in terms of stability and balance, but we also were well aware that the ship's engines would be working in overdrive to actually make progress in either direction; which frankly would never happen. The only thing that _would_ happen would be the cooling of the engines eventually giving away, before undoubtedly combusting into a fiery ball.

 _"Let's go"_ I ordered the others to go, slashing the controls with my sword for good measure to ensure that we wouldn't have to deal with some other Alpha coming along and trying to fix the problem. After remaining for a split second longer to ensure that the ship wasn't going to stall after the console was destroyed, I followed Gunner's map in the direction of the escape pods that we had ran past, before quickly contacting our no doubt anxious pilots waiting patiently for some kind of signal from us. "Paul, Marvin, we're going to be launching out of the battlecruiser in various escape pods. Please prepare for separate pick-ups on the port side of this battlecruiser"

"Roger Mila" I was endlessly relieved to hear Paul's voice on the other end of the line, the heavy sounds of his Banshee flying around telling me that he certainly was giving the enemy outside something else to focus on, rather than the fighters doing their best near our own massive spacecraft. "We may have to make several different runs to pick you guys up, as we've got several bogies still present"

"Are we to be expecting the battlecruiser to be exploding soon after you have launched from the ship?" Marvin also chimed in, effectively spelling out that he had also heard my orders. While I would have liked to give him a concrete answer on which one he could be expecting, we had no evidence to suggest when the engines wouldn't be able to handle the pressure.

"Not sure about that final query, but I'd prefer to not play it so close. Pick people up the moment you are able to" I told them this, before receiving a short sharp affirmation from them both. While I had our escape route effectively planned, it seemed that the Alpha within that ship were going to be a little more trouble than we had hoped.

 _"Mila, vast hordes of Alpha are coming in our direction"_ Gunner reported that bad news right as we neared the escape pods from before, quickly showing me his map to show the various crawling red indicators making their way forward within the ship. Not all of them were heading to us however; as there were a number of them passing over our heads in another corridor, instead making sharp turns to head towards the bridge where we had just been. It was like I had expected from them, them all coming out of the woodwork the moment you poked in some other location of their precious hive.

" _Jfred, Malaki, play interference while we get our pack members into these pods"_ I instructed the two stronger members of our team, before some shuffling of weapons happened between us all to give both Alpha some stronger guns to shoot down any Alpha coming our way. While they stood guard, Gunner got to work by pulling out his secondary stash of little electronic discs that he had been given by Corey. Placing one of them firmly against the control panel of one of the pods, it zapped everything it touched quite violently before overriding the controls, which then allowed Gunner access to the controls for all of the pods in that area without the need for any sort of code or keycard.

Gunner ushered his wife in first, as most of the other members of our pack were dawdling a little in both politeness and because they wanted to help cull the advancing Alpha before they were forced to leave. The moment Mayu was nestled in the pod, Gunner closed the door and launched it at the same time as four other pods, giving her the best chance of survival considering the surrounding helicopters.

" _You're going to have to work a little faster than that"_ Malaki informed the quick footed Beta, as down the hallway from us a number of Alpha were trying to pry open a set of locked doors akin to what we had done. Naturally they no longer had the advantage of being able to tell their mates up in the bridge to open and close doors for them (at that point in time anyway), so they were running into problems as well... But they did have more Alpha than we did. Even it took them all the same five minutes that we had to open it, that sounded far too soon for my liking. With the sharp _crack_ coming from the heavy pistol now in Malaki's hands, one of the Alpha was handled, but the group coming from that way was particularly large.

Everyone who wasn't assisting Gunner in opening the doors began to join in the maelstrom of bullets and plasma raining down on those Alpha that were appearing at the end of the hallway. The next set of pods were ready, causing Gunner to hurriedly tap Sera and Bobby on their shoulders to usher those two into them. With our rapidly dwindling group I could tell that Bryan would have to hurry to reach the pods remotely in time, which urged me to gently peel the scanner away from Gunner's hip and inspect it for a split second.

Bryan... Was nowhere near the escape pods. In fact, it seemed that because of the fortune of all of the Alpha leaving the engine room and heading to the bridge, he had managed to stumble and limp his way entirely to the very set of engines that were keeping the bird afloat. Because the Alpha had no clue that we had even lost a member in the first place (beyond the Alpha Bryan had gone to handle naturally, but they were dead), they all were entirely focused either on handling us or going to their bridge in an attempt to reverse what we had done.

"Bryan, what do you think you're doing?!" I asked him hurriedly, ignoring the momentary flash of confusion coming from my pack members. They didn't have long to ponder it as it was, as Gunner was escorting Malaki and Jfred into the next two pods. Even if Bryan sprinted back to us - which seemed like it was impossible due to how slow his indicator was moving - the chances of him being able to snag one of the pods was low.

"...Sorry Mila, but it looks like the original plan of me making my way back... Isn't going to work out" Bryan struggled to talk over the communicator, speaking in slow sentences with a heavy rasp to his speech. Even when he wasn't talking, there was a clear sound of him trying to either swallow or spit out some type of liquid that often spilled out of his mouth... And I had a heavy suspicion that I knew what liquid was. He had suffered enough chest wounds the first time he had dialled in to explain it, and I could only image how tattered his body might have looked right in that moment. "...I wanted to be some kind of safe guard... In case the sabotage didn't work out"

I didn't have much more time to talk with him, as I was the next person to have my shoulder hurriedly tapped on. The next four pods were ready, and it seemed to be that Gunner wanted us to take them before it was too late. I knew that begging Bryan to make it back to us was impossible; he likely wouldn't even survive the trip back to the Helicarrier if we did... But that didn't make it any easier on me. Maybe it was just because this was the first person who was speaking directly to me before their untimely death, that small difference making me want to pull of some kind of non-existent miracle.

"...You just - pah! - You just let me know when you need this... God awful ship destroyed" I could have almost exactly imagine the silly proud grin adorning his face, just endlessly pleased to be able to report in to me one final time; being helpful to us all even if it was only in the most minor of ways possible. And to that, I could only find the courage within my mind to say one thing in response... The exact same thing that he had told me when we were going on ahead without him before.

"...Okay" I managed to get that single word past my lips, and I could hear the final sounds of a chuckle coming from him. Only a second later was there the sound of rustling, perhaps the sound of him finding some comfortable spot to sit down while he waited for that final order, and from then on it seemed to be too difficult for him to talk.

 _"Mila, we need to go!"_ Gunner tapped on my shoulder for what felt like the billionth time in that short increment of space and time (despite the fact it likely only had been the second time he had done so), and I finally allowed his mannerisms to take my full attention into consideration. With the Alpha down the hallway starting to be able to slip their forms through the door, it seemed to be just at the right time for us to escape. After shooting one of the two who had managed to come through the doors, Gunner hurriedly ushered me into one of the four escape pods, which I quite happily shuffled myself into. Before the doors were shut on my pod, I could feel the worry coming from my other three pack members who were still on the ship. " _Damn it, this pod isn't working correctly! It short circuited after the engines started to go haywire, so it may have caused for the problems in the ones next to it as well!"_

 _"Then just bundle Connor and yourself into Mila's pod"_ Amanda hurriedly shoved her husband and our current semi-experienced technician into my pod, as my one was the only one that wasn't on either side of what was likely to be the malfunctioning pod. It certainly was cramped, but we had learned via the schematics for other battlecruisers on Alfu that escape pods on those ships could actually handle a maximum of three people in an emergency. Only a second after our doors closed could we hear her somewhat startled scream, seeing her dive into the pod directly next to ours.

 _"Am, baby, are you alright?"_ Connor worriedly asked his wife while Gunner struggled to figure out how to launch the pod from the inside of the thing itself. He eventually did find it, as he had to shift Connor a bit out of the way to properly find the panel, his fingers going through the menu to find the button that would launch us (but not eject us from the pod at the same time).

 _"I'm alright, but the Alpha that came through the doors is pounding on my pod door"_ Amanda managed to relieve us for a brief second, and I decided that it was high time to send the signal to Bryan to blow the ship into smithereens. Immediately after I tapped the Morse-code signal for b-l-o-w to Bryan, I received back a very slow o-k once more, and I braced myself for the pod to launch; my mind telling the others that we likely had a couple of seconds at most. " _...I'll launch my pod after you guys are clear"_

...And that was when we could tell that Gunner's estimation of the damage to the other pods had been correct; she was lying to us. While her words said that she was simply biding her time, her mind told us the truth; that her pod simply _couldn't_ launch. Getting out was impossible, as not only would the Alpha pounding on her door would prevent her from making it to us, but Gunner, Connor and Amanda knew from reading my mind to know that the explosion was coming all too soon. The moment I could hear the sound of a gun cocking over my communication vector, and Gunner could register that from our link, he made the smart (yet tough) decision to slam on the button to launch our pod.

 _"NO!!_ " Connor's mind cried out in utter horror once the escape pod violently expelled us from the ship, rattling both men's bodies because of them not being situated correctly into the padded chair as I was. Whether we liked it or not, we had a front row seat to the destruction of that bloated cruiser, the doors on our pod being perfectly aimed at the ship as we rocketed away from it.

A single shot. _Bang, whizz;_ the shot banged into some metal around the engine but didn't quite do enough damage the first time around. The second shot. _Bang..._

The battlecruiser lit up marvellously, the newly unlocked doors and corridors (likely from the Alpha that soon after arrived in the bridge, trying to get everything open to find us) acting as funnels to spread around the blazing fire shooting out from the engines. With a shuddering blast, the entire ship seemed to glow a bright orange before violently erupting, sending shrapnel and various bits of machinery in every single direction. Even with the triumphant feeling surging within my mind with taking out one of the five main threats to everyone, it felt... Hollow, especially when I felt Connor clutch onto me and bury his head into my shoulder... Combined with those unpleasant reminders whispering in my ear.

"...Bryan and Amanda's life signs have flat-lined"


	5. In Space; Flying by the Seat of your Pants

We didn't have any more time to dwell on our fresh losses, as we could hear the sound of battle still raging on from the helicopters swarming outside of our pod. I could only hope that the other members of the pack had been picked up from their pods, as getting to them ourselves was likely going to be an exercise in futility.

"Paul, can your sensors pick us up? Connor, Gunner and I had to launch in the same escape pod" I called out to him as my hands reached out to pull open the emergency container within the pod, which held three spare Oz kits for us to use. We could collectively hear the sound of several helicopters noisily fly by our pod, them not daring to fire on us while they were uncertain of who was inside.

"Roger Mila, my radar picks you guys up readily. All other launches from the ship had been successfully picked up by Marvin" Paul reported that everyone else had managed to gathered while we were still busy inside the battlecruiser, which meant that we only had to worry about the three of us still getting on board either the Valkyrie or Banshee. "The Valkyrie is already full due to Marvin collecting the five launching before you, as his ship is better built for pickups than mine. Where are the final two remaining pack members?"

"We're all that's left" I had to put it bluntly, as there was no time for us to be lingering around the remains of the battlecruiser. Connor grimaced when I said that, and I could hear the heavy silence coming over the communication vector; telling me that Marvin was likely taking the news just as bad as the rest of us had been.

"...Damn it" I could just barely hear Paul hiss that over his intercom, as we had already lost far too many out of our pack than we were hoping for. Tanner and Kevin had been because of bad luck, but he hadn't been updated about Bryan and Amanda until just then. With a sharp breath in, Paul was right back into getting the rest of back to the Helicarrier. "I'd recommend getting out of the pod one at a time when I signal for pickup; as I can't be hovering in one place for too long right now. Hopefully after one of you gets picked up, they'll ignore your pod entirely"

"Ladies first" Gunner made the remark in complete seriousness, despite the words themselves usually being reserved for jokes and japes. I could understand why I was going first - I was the leader - but it still made me uncomfortable to think of the possibility of both men getting blown away if the Alpha even had a single bit of sense about them. Reaching up to the hatch above me, my ears waited anxiously to hear the signal from Paul.

"Arriving at your pod in five seconds"

I furiously tugged on the hatch, even getting a little help from both men to crank the machinery open. Almost immediately the feeling of weightlessness caused us to gently float in space, with Connor and Gunner holding onto another part of the pod while I pushed the lid open and climbed out.

As my Oz kit flared into life, creating a little bubble around my face and neck, I only had to turn my head slightly to see the Banshee soaring towards my pod. It was slightly proceeded by the Valkyrie right behind him; Marvin acting as the guard to his fellow pilot. Only a single second before Paul's Banshee would have just come flying above my pod (which I then could have reached upwards and latched on for a short ride before climbing in), I could hear the vague sounds of some kind of missile being fired.

"Paul, missile!" Marvin managed to call out that command right in time, as they likely wouldn't have been able to shoot it down with pinpoint accuracy while they had their backs to it. Instead, Paul had to hurriedly shift his Banshee in mid-flight, twisting just enough in an aileron roll to avoid the missile... But it also meant that our two pilots had to completely divert away from me. "Sorry Mila, we need to shake these guys before coming to get you! We may be a little while!"

Even I could tell without having to be told that, as right behind them was a massive swarm of helicopters following in their wake. The majority naturally followed after their pretty lights and gliding movements, but a singular helicopter did see me floating just a bit over the pod, and turned his attention towards me. I could tell straight away that clambering back into the pod was a bad idea, as that would only lead to the helicopter firing upon the entire pod itself (taking out not only myself, but the two Beta waiting for pickup as well). Gritting my teeth, I gently let go with one of my hands from the pod, taking out one of my heavy pistols before firing it at the sensitive glass of the aircraft making its way towards me.

The Alpha had since decided to upgrade that much at least, as while my heavy pistol fired a plasma shot with a heavy _crack_ , it didn't managed to do much beyond cracking the outside surface of the glass. Expecting retribution, I tucked away the pistol and started to hurriedly glide my way around the side of the pod while I could hear the sound of the miniguns whirring as they began to start up.

 _"Mila, what's that noise?"_ Connor asked what was going on, our pack link still working despite the metal separating us. I didn't exactly have the time to respond with a coherent thought or noise, but he could pick out bits of information from my mind to figure out what was going on. " _Hold on, we're coming out to help!"_

Before I could retort that coming out would do nothing beyond getting themselves hurt (or killed) alongside me, the miniguns did the answering for me, swiping over one particular angle of the pod. The hatch of the pod opened for a brief moment, but wisely closed before any of the bullets could make their way into the pod itself. While I managed to scramble around enough to just barely dodge the bullets aiming for my head and body, there was a stray ricochet that seemed to whizz right behind my neck; the cracking noise of it penetrating into my Oz kit being just barely audible over the loud whirring of the helicopters machinery.

While the helicopter had managed to get itself off balance in its attempt to hit me (they still were not built for space, despite them seeming like they were operating alright), I was forced to completely let go of the pod because of my hands shutting off my oxygen pathways. With one hand focusing on tightly pinching my nose shut and the other clamping over my mouth, I was trying my best to conserve the small amount of oxygen that I still had, and hurriedly trying to make my brain come up with a plan before it became too oxygen deprived to work properly. Even though dying by floating out in space sounded absolutely horrific, the cold calculating part of my brain reminded me that receiving help would only get our best engineer and navigator in trouble...

 _"I've got you"_ Connor and Gunner were not content with that idea however, the hatch popping open a moment later with them both appearing out of it. Using the momentary lull in firing, Connor managed to reach upwards to grasp one of my ankles before I completely floated away from him, before carefully peeling his own Oz kit off the back of his neck. _"We're going to be buddy breathing with this, alright?"_

When he placed it on me, I gratefully took a giant gulp of air in, coughing a little to clear my airways. Connor patiently waited for me to take another breath in, before I dislodged it from my own neck and placed it back on him. While Connor and I were passing that back and forth between each other, Gunner's attention was on the helicopter; the machine just starting to restabilise itself and aim in our direction. With all three of us on the top of the pod, Gunner could tell that he needed to be the one doing something while he had his own secure Oz kit.

Placing down a separate bounce pad onto the side of our pod, he placed his feet directly onto it, allowing the machine to not only forcefully propel him towards the helicopter but also ensure that Connor and I were further away from the danger. As I tried my best to multitask getting enough oxygen and pulling out my pistol, I tried to fire another shot against the glass of the helicopter; valiantly trying to take care of the aircraft before it could cause any more damage.

The plasma shot ended up causing another series of cracks to appear in the glass, but Gunner landing on the helicopter caused it to go more off balance than my shot did. As the Alpha within the helicopter struggled to regain their easily lost balance, Gunner made use of their confusion to climb his way around the helicopter, specifically heading towards the tail motor at the rear. With him having a far better location for him to shoot than the rest of us could do, Gunner took a shot against one of the sensitive parts of the tail rotor, one half of it shattering into a million pieces.

With the vitally important part of the helicopter out of commission, the entire craft started to violently spin around in one spot like a spinning top, our navigator not being able to do much beyond hold on tight and try not to projectile vomit from the sensation.

 _"Gunner, try and use one of the bounce pads to make it back to us!"_ I saw it as the only way for him to be able to make it back towards us, as simply letting go would more likely result in him being smacked by some large part of the machine. He did as I suggested, pulling out another bounce pad and attempting to use it at the right moment... Only for his timing to be off, launching him off in the opposite direction from Connor and I. _"Gunner!"_

 _"I'm alright"_ He at least hadn't been hurt by the attempt to handle the helicopter, him searching around in his pockets for some other kind of tool that he could use to redirect himself back to us without being taken out by the massive spinning death trap that was the aircraft. He didn't seem to find anything useful beyond his pistol, so he started to unload the clip against the helicopter in a vain attempt to at least get some last use out of it. _"I'll at least make sure that those assholes in that ship get their comeuppance"_

"We're coming back around!" Marvin announced at exactly the wrong time that they were coming back with that massive horde of helicopters right after them. The Banshee was just ahead as it had been last time, but I could distinctly tell that it was veering off in my direction to collect Connor and I holding onto the pod. The chances of us getting to Gunner in time was close to zero, and I had a strong inkling that Paul wouldn't have even followed the order if I had asked it of him to get the navigator first; as not only was I more important in terms of leadership, Connor and I had the numbers advantage.

"Pick up Connor and I" I gave the order to Paul when I got handed the Oz kit, even though it was clear that he was already coming to get us. As I glanced over to Gunner, the only response I got out of him was a sharp salute; a confident grin on his face... One which would have been fake several years ago, but had become nothing but the truth since.

When the Banshee was practically on top of us, Connor and I reached up with our hands and grasped the first lip of that ship that we could manage to wrap our fingers around, before being dragged unceremoniously along with the ship. I had to pry my eyes away from Gunner's final stand there (with several of the following helicopters dragging behind to go after him), holding tight onto Connor as he used his superior Beta muscles to carefully bring us both to the door of the Banshee, clambering inside the ship.

"That's all of us" Grateful to simply be able to breath in the air within the Banshee, I quickly darted forward to be able to stand directly behind Paul. Connor decided to go for the far more secure seating in the ship, clipping himself nervously... While also looking glumly at the various empty seats around him. Paul also gritted his teeth for a second, a blip of regret passing by in his mind about not being able to save each one of our trio from that situation, but I could tell that he would have regretted it more if he had left me behind in place of Gunner.

"Gunner's life signs have flat-

"Mila, are you reading me?" Matthias interrupted the announcement that I already knew was coming, and frankly I was more than grateful to have something else drawing my attention at the time rather than just how frighteningly empty our ship felt. "The other battlecruiser with the massive gun has turned around in the meantime, and it's tearing our troops apart"

His words got punctuated by the sound and shockwave of the very same gun firing right ahead of us, destroying yet another cluster of troops. Even with the second wave of troops there to support the first wave, we had lost quite a lot in the meantime, and it would be poor timing to release the third wave with all of the rubble across the battlefield.

"Pull back the fighters so that we have a massive wave to release later; right now they'd be as effective as throwing bullets" I gave him an order, and I could soon see him implement it as the first amount of fighters started to wisely turn around back to our base. Once my pack got back there as well, there was going to be far better odds with our heavier ships being able to join in with the battle.

"Marvin, the turret seems to be locking on to your position" Paul warned the pilot directly behind him, as not only was the sonar loudly announcing that to us, we were already able to see it by the massive turret slowly cranking around in an intimidating gesture. But while they had gotten lucky with Tanner and his ship, Marvin was not going to be so easily taken out by it.

"Roger, using evasive manoeuvres to avoid it's shot" Marvin announced that a split second before the gun fired, and all Marvin had to do was barrel roll sharply to avoid both the shot and its subsequent shockwave. The massive gun couldn't fire so quickly in a row, so we knew that we were clear for a little while longer, but the worrying part came a second later. "One of the helicopters clipped one of my rear thrusters during that move. It's making us a little slower, but we're still flying"

I once again borrowed one of Paul's monitors to look behind us, and I could see that Marvin had underplayed just how much slower they had become. The Valkyrie already was a slower craft than the Banshee, and with the slower speed Marvin was trailing much further behind than he was before... But what really drew my attention was that sneaky third battlecruiser in the background, who was looking like it was up to something yet again.

"Marvin, do you think you would be able to survive another electric blast in your current capacity?" I asked him out of curiosity, and if the slight delay in his answer was anything to go on, then the answer was not in the affirmative side of things.

"...Not really. I'd either be sitting without engines, shielding or life support, and you know how that sort of answer would end" Marvin grumbled, the sounds of flipping switches audible over the communication vector as he tried to correct the problems that he was currently dealing with. It didn't seem to do enough, as Marvin sighed yet again; realising that he was going to be sitting right out in the middle of the battlefield... Not only in the similar vein as his oldest brother, but he'd be dragging down the five other troops on his ship with him. "...Dang it. Jfred! Take over here for me!"

"Wha- Hey!" The Valkyrie wobbled ever so slightly, signifying that Marvin had released the controls suddenly to his cousin, who by the sounds of the communication vector had to lunge for the controls. Before anyone within their ship or ours could ask what the youngest Valle brother was doing, the rear door of the Valkyrie opened, and the emergency fighter stationed in the back of the ship took off in the direction of the helicopters. "Marvin!"

"I'm not doing a suicide run, this is simply the best possible chance for people to survive" Marvin explained, and I completely understood, as the both of us had often thought on similar wavelengths to each other in the past. "Not only is the Valkyrie lighter now, but the fighters had shown earlier that they can recover quicker from that sort of blast"

"Yes, but only in a situation where they were in a big enough swarm where the chances of getting shot down was close to zero! You're charging straight into a horde of people!" Paul angrily chastised his fellow pilot over the intercom, looking like he was considering smacking him if he happened to be available later. But even though Paul's thoughts were begging me to let him go after him, he knew that it was a bad idea to leave the Banshee to a complete novice when the electric blast came along... And luckily for him, I was far from a novice.

All he needed from me was a firm touch on the shoulder, reminding him that I was right there next to him. With my mind urging him to go after our second best pilot, he lingered for only a second later to make sure that he hadn't misunderstood what I was asking of him. Once he was certain, he and I swapped places like a special kind of dance, the controls of the Banshee directly underneath my fingertips.

"Marvin! Right now your orders are to keep your stupid ass alive until I can get to you!" Paul still had some bit within him that could order people around well, and in that split second I could have easily imagined him wearing his stupidly orange military uniform yet again. Getting inside his own backup ship - his good old vulture that was hanging around in the back of the Banshee - Paul opened the doors for only a split second before charging out.

"Mila, what's the plan?" Jfred worriedly asked me, as of course he had been left behind with the Valkyrie that was not in the most favourable position as it was. Not only was Marvin now storming into the horde of the enemies following behind him, but Paul was also chasing off after the aforementioned cousin with gusto. It was only natural that he was worried, even more so when the third battlecruiser was looking like it was getting ready to release its own pulse.

"Don't worry; you don't have to a single thing" I spoke confidently for one of the first times in that short expanse of time, as I had a perfect plan in motion. After gesturing for Connor to leave his seat and join me in the cockpit (sitting in the co-pilot seat and slapping another Oz kit on himself), I was all set in my ship.

As expected, the third battlecruiser released another wave of electricity all across the battlefield. With the most carefree gesture, I calmly switched off the life support and shielding for our ship, leaving everything for the engines. Even as Connor glanced nervously at me as our collective Oz kits came back, I was more than pleased to see that directing all of the power to the engines meant we were still flying well; even faster than what we were doing before.

"Shoot!" Unsurprisingly, Marvin's fighter had stalled, with Jfred's cry coming a moment later when his less experienced flying meant that the Valkyrie was sitting still as well. Connor gently turned a monitor for me to look at after my mind insisted that he do so, which allowed me to view exactly what Paul and Marvin were doing at the same time.

Paul's vulture had been tinkered with long enough that it passed the electrical wave with not even a sign of a wobble, it still darting towards Marvin's fighter. With it being completely reinforced to resist most causes of dangers, Paul had the easiest time simply crashing through the enemies in his way.

 _"Like a living missile"_ I found myself grinning at the memory, it being one of the very first things I had learned about Paul and his vulture eighteen years prior. Even Connor found himself smiling in agreement; he had been there after all, the memory becoming a very fond one despite how he had thought that the pilot was too silly back then. Not willing to be outdone by my partner, I took sharp control of the Banshee and forced it upwards until we were heading right back to the Valkyrie behind us.

Paul's entrance into the fighter was not really expected by Marvin, as the latter shouted in surprise as Paul ploughed through the back of the ship. At first glance most people would have assumed it was either done on accident or because Paul had suddenly switched sides, but Paul soon after left a message for him over the communication vector.

"Climb towards that hole. Once you're there, you will have a split second to grab onto my vulture as it comes back around" Paul gave Marvin very simple instructions, but even with those the rest of us on the same wavelength could hear the worried chattering coming from Marvin's own communicator. "Are you ready Marvin?"

"Not really!"

"Too bad; we're not getting another chance"

While Paul slowed down just that little bit through the fighter to give Marvin a better chance of grabbing on, I flew sharply around our waiting allies until I was at the rear of them. Knowing that the Valkyrie could withstand more damage, I directly flew the Banshee into the back of their ship, watching as the metal around our own cockpit bent a bit from the force.

" _Jesus, Mila"_ Connor was a little worried by the sudden damage, but I ignored it, pushing onwards. With the extra power to the Banshee's engines, I was able to push and get the Valkyrie moving at a decent pace back towards the waiting Helicarrier. Glancing over at the same monitor from before, I was relieved to see the Vulture on its way back; extended into a two-seater while Marvin was clambering into the rear seat.

"Be careful Mila, the turret is aiming for you now" Paul warned me, his vulture soon shooting past my Banshee and the Valkyrie that I was moving. With his smaller ship and more agile movements, he was easily able to distract the turret like a bee would distract most larger enemies. The person manning the gun quickly got irritated with his erratic movements, and tried to fire upon him "There, it should take a while to reload now"

"Hey Paul, Mila, do your backs hurt?" I could hear Jfred ask us over the intercom, and for a split second I thought he was serious. While I felt my back and glanced at my monitors to see what on Alfu he might have been referring to, it soon became obvious a second later that he was attempting to crack a joke to bring our spirits up. "Because the both of you are certainly carrying this part of the mission"

A momentary snort left Connor's mouth, as it was so poorly timed to be mentioning that. But like the snapping of a switch, Matthias interrupted his younger brother's efforts, to alert us.

"Guys, our reinforced shielding is going to be coming up in a couple of seconds" Matthias calmly reminded us, but we knew quite well that it was a hefty warning that we couldn't casually ignore. If we weren't within the hangar before the reinforced shielding came up, then our ships wouldn't be able to slip through the shielding; we would instead slam right into it like it was made of metal. "You'd better hurry"

"We're working on it" Paul responded to that, having to play distraction for me one last time as the turret turned to try and hit my Banshee. The Valkyrie safely made it back inside the hangar, landing a bit roughly onto the metal floor once it had gravity back, but from the slight grunting coming over the communication everyone had made it safe and sound within that ship. Only a second later my Banshee slipped through as well, having to move a little bit further to find a spot between the several fighters. But even as Connor's and my Oz kits went back to normal, my mind wasn't completely done.

"Paul, don't waste any more time playing with the helicopters out there" I told him that, as I could turn my head just a bit to see that he had to bob and weave through several of their units before he could follow after me. It wasn't stupid, as he knew that crashing through them would take longer than just avoiding them, but that didn't make my tense feelings leave any sooner.

**"Warning; reinforced shielding raised in three seconds"**

Paul truly could hear that; not only through his ear piece but undoubtedly from the vibrations running through his ship. He charged the ship directly towards the hangar, banking everything on making it at the very last second rather than remaining out onto the battlefield.

**"Two"**

He either was going to just barely make it, or slam right into the shielding a moment too late. And considering the helicopters right behind him (some of which were opening fire on us to try and hurt us, but the loose shielding already repelled those bullets), we couldn't order the shielding to be delayed.

**"One"**

Due to the fact Paul had extended his vulture into a two seater to save Marvin, he just barely didn't fit his entire craft through it; the shielding just barely cutting off the rear engines of his ship. The rest of it still came through however; hurtling through the air like a horrific javelin. It didn't even stop the moment it contacted the floor, proceeding to skid and create sparks in its swath of carnage; very nearly crashing into me if it wasn't for the timely yank that Connor had done to pull me out of the way. With a horrendous sounding crash, the vulture only came to a halt when the nose of the ship slammed into the far hangar wall.


	6. In Space; Shipwide Troubles

The crew within the hangar had always been trained to run away from a crashed ship, lest it be so badly damaged that it may explode and cause further damage. As such, it looked especially weird for everyone else to be running or pulling their fighters further away from the wreckage, while Connor and I were running directly towards it. There hadn't yet been an announcement from Blaire about either pilot's life signs, so there was a chance that they were able to be saved from the vulture.

 **"Warning; fire detected in the hangar. Please stay out of the way of emergency protocol droids"** The Helicarrier managed to already figure out that the ship was steadily going up in flames long before we could see the red and orange hues of the fire, with several little busy robots flying above our heads with fire suppression equipment in their little metal hands.

"Give me one of those!" Bobby called out to one of the droids, being forced to leap to his unusually high heights to actually grab one of the fire extinguishers when the robot wouldn't relinquish it. This wasn't exactly unusual, as those robots were supposed to ignore people when they were working to avoid being influenced by panicked people, but it did mean that we had to take things by force if they were focusing on the wrong thing.

It wasn't only Bobby's words that clued us in to our other pack members coming to help us, as Jfred and Malaki's thundering footsteps and Sera and Mayu's worried chattering were other obvious indicators. With everyone within the pack going there, we had the best chance of getting Paul and Marvin out safely.

Just as I began to wonder why neither man was getting out of the construct, we could hear the sound of people pounding on the glass from the inside. The doors likely had been jammed during the crash, and the increasing smoke coming from the ship was making things difficult to tell who was exactly able to reach up. They likely were both trying to smash the glass to be able to get out, but the glass had been reinforced several times to avoid destruction by the pressure of space or bullets, so it was far harder to do than people claimed.

 _"Help! The lid won't come off!"_ Marvin spelled out what I had already predicted, the combined banging coming from the both of them trying to break through the sturdy material. They had been able to sense that we were nearby, and luckily his internal voice was far louder than any kind of shouting would get him. And if the steadily greyer look inside their seats was anything to go by, then speaking would have just caused him to ingest something nasty into his lungs.

"Malaki, get Paul; I've got Marvin!" Jfred told the other Alpha to head more towards the crumpled front of the ship, as that was rapidly being set ablaze from the leaking fuel. After waiting for a split second to let Bobby hurriedly spray the cooling mist over the metal hatch of the rear seat, Jfred soon got his hands stuck in, ripping off the lid with a sharp _shriek_ of metal tearing.

The rear seat had steadily been filling up with smoke from the main cockpit, especially evidenced by the sudden cloud of smoke that burst out from it the moment it touched fresh air. Marvin seemed to have not ingested enough smoke to fall unconscious, his hands hurriedly coming out and trying to drag himself out of the heated wreckage. With Jfred and Connor doing just fine in helping the Omega out of the rear seat, I moved upwards with Bobby to help out in any manner with the main pilot of the ship.

"Ow, damn it!" Malaki hadn't quite been patient enough to wait for Bobby, as his hands seemed to sting from touching the heated metal. The main cockpit naturally was the closest part to the growing inferno (this was likely why Malaki had tried to rush things), and it took far longer for Bobby's wide spraying movements to cool down the metal to a reasonable temperature for handling... All the while, the faint sounds of someone knocking on the glass dome was getting quieter.

"I've got another extinguisher!" Sera joined us just a second later, her being distracted for a moment to retrieve another cooling device, her second spray speeding the process along. Even though my muscles were puny in comparison to the Alpha, I still found my hands shooting to the side of the hatch to try and pull it open along with him.

An even blacker cloud of smoke billowed out the moment Malaki pulled the hatch open, and it was accompanied shortly afterwards by Paul coughing loudly. Even with most of the smoke now no longer getting in the way, Paul still looked incredibly woozy and delirious, so most of my attention went to holding his head upright (to both keep his head above the smoke and to stop him from accidentally banging his head against something) while I let Malaki do the further heavy lifting to get him out.

"Hold on, I've got you" Malaki reassured the Beta the best he could, carefully clambering onto the top of the ship so that he could life out the pilot without bumping him too much. The problem became obvious a moment later, as the moment the Alpha put his hands underneath Paul's armpits, he was only able to pull the pilot up a little bit before Paul screamed at what felt like an incredibly high decibel. While he didn't want to hurt the other much, he tried again (earning him another cry of pain), only stopping when he still couldn't yank the other free. "He's stuck on something! Whatever it is, get him loose!"

Sera helped me by spraying a short burst of spray in the direction of Paul's legs, as that was the only thing that we could imagine that would be stopping him. The spray cleared the smoke for a second or two, showing that during the crash the front of the ship had crumbled in such a way that it had shoved several sharp looking metal planks into his right lower leg. Forget wiggling his leg free, it was completely impaled by three separate spikes.

"Mayu, hold his head for me" I swapped over that task to the waiting Beta behind me, as she didn't have anything particular to do right in that moment. With the encroaching fire coming closer towards the main cockpit, I unfortunately didn't have time to delicately poke around with my sword to cut away the bits of metal in his legs, so I had to make a choice. It was either taking off his leg or losing him entirely... And there was no way that I was going to accept the latter. "...Sorry about this Paul"

Despite his delirious state, his eyes did glance over to me when he heard his name being called, and he only had to tilt his eyes a bit further upwards to see the gleaming shine coming from my sword high above my head. Whether he approved of the plan or simply was unaware of what I was doing, he didn't seem to shrink away when the sword swung downwards... But the ear piercing screech coming out his mouth a moment later spelled out that he truly did feel his upper leg come loose from his knee.

"Got him!" Malaki was naturally able to pull him free from the wreckage, completely ignoring the copious amounts of blood that the other was getting on him. With everyone now free of the vulture, we did follow our typical training in running away from the wreckage, but in a particular direction rather than the haphazard scatter that most other fighter pilots had been doing in the meantime.

" _Get Paul and Marvin to the medical ward"_ I instructed the two Alpha who were carrying the injured men around, with Malaki following after his fellow class member when he had tied a firm kind of tourniquet around his patient's leg. Even as we ran through those familiar hallways to our own destinations, I still couldn't help but feel uncomfortable with the thundering and shaking that came from the large turret trying to destroy our shielding. So far it felt like it hadn't gotten much damage done (we had ensured that each individual part of our ship had its own specific shield, so firing in different spots did not even phase it compared to the average ship), but I wasn't keen on finding out how much damage it could do if it managed to punch through in one specific location. _"Everybody else with me to the bridge"_

It felt eerie to realise that I only had a total of four people following behind me, to which my brain naturally went through a checklist as though it was unusual to have so little. With five of my pack remaining behind in the Helicarrier at all times, another five being lost in our success of taking out the battlecruiser and the solitary gun on the other battlecruiser, together with the four that had just diverged off to the medical ward... Then yes, I was left with only four to accompany me. The Maths certainly did add up, but it made an uncomfortable equation regardless of the answer.

Matthias was taken a bit aback when I came running onto the bridge, as I was of course covered in various types of blood; both from allies and from enemies alike. It certainly made for a grisly sight; especially for the rest of the crew on the bridge who had been fortunate enough to avoid seeing any of the gory details of fights (the entire bridge was still completely white and mute grey colours, which looked a little odd to me for a moment). But while it did make them uncomfortable, I didn't have time to go back out and get myself cleaned up during the fight.

"Paul is out of commission for the rest of the fight, but he's alive. Marvin is also in the medical ward for a moment to clear up any potential issues he may have from smoke inhalation, and the two Alpha are dropping them off there momentarily" I started to list of things to Matthias, skipping right ahead to the part where he and I form a plan on how we were going to handle the final two battlecruisers with our diminished forces. Trent and Corey had gathered in the bridge as well - the latter of which was hurriedly giving orders to his engineers running all throughout the ship - the both of them listening intently as well to make sure that they could respond the best way possible to our position. "The Valkyrie and Banshee require some minor repairs to them, but the vulture is in a really bad state. How are things going over here?"

"Not too great; we lost around four million of our first wave of fighters and a subsequent six million in the second wave" Matthias sighed, momentarily taking the time to pinch the bridge of his nose in an annoyed gesture. Losing ten million of our total twenty-five million fighters was not great, and I could see from the frown on Corey's face that this had already been brought up to him and his best friend before. "I tried to enlist ten million of our thirty-five million engineers to swap over to bolster the final wave, but the logistics of it are... Complicated"

"If by complicated you mean that it's only going to get people killed, then yes; it's ' _complicated'_ " Corey wasn't bothering to hide his disdain for the idea, as he knew his engineers better than anyone else within our pack. It wasn't an opinion we could casually ignore as it was, as his engineers were the reason our ship was even still floating in space instead of being blown to bits; keeping the localised shielding and life support up and running at the very same time as continually repairing our fighters that managed to make it back to the hangar in one piece. "We don't have enough ships, so we would have to risk more lives of our current fighters to bring back semi-functioning debris from the battlefield - not to mention psychologically scarring people by having to drag out the dead bodies of their comrades - before slapping repair tools on them and welding things together. Even if - if, I say! - we manage to do that, you're going to be sending out people who never volunteered to fight on the front lines, who wouldn't be able to figure out how to fly the correct way up even if you glued a glowing neon sign on the correct buttons!"

"Look, I get that it sounds absolutely like it is doomed from the start, but we need to do something beyond throwing our last remaining fighters out without a plan" I agreed more with Matthias, as I knew quite a bit of engineers would gladly offer to pilot if it meant that we would win the war. While we had been optimistic in not forcing people to do what they didn't want to do, the actual situation was more dire than common courtesy would allow. And while Corey was correct in the fact that slowly siphoning in the correct parts was going to be an exercise in futility, there was another option that his best friend could give us. "Trent, do you still have that magnetic field installed on the inside of the ship?"

"I do actually, but it's more built to slam smaller enemy ships against our reinforced hull" Trent rattled off that piece of information without really thinking on why I was asking it. It didn't take him much longer to make small little links to what we had been talking about directly beforehand to my question, as by then people in my pack (and the movement) knew that I didn't often ask questions for no reason. "...Oh! You're thinking that we might be able to pull in ships magnetically!"

"It was crossing my mind, yes" I said that as I glanced over at Matthias, to see whether such a plan would even work. He quickly brought up a map in front of him about how littered the battlefield was, and the majority of fighters had come to a halt in front of the battlecruiser or our own hangar. "If we focus most of the energy on our hangar and lightly swing the Helicarrier from side to side, we should be able to pick up the majority of the left behind ships"

"We would have to occasionally drop the reinforced shielding on the hangar, but the magnetic field should also clear up our worries of the helicopters plaguing our entrance" Trent was completely on board with the idea, already picking up a number of his tools that he had been tinkering with in the bridge to head to the hangar. He no doubt was going to be focusing entirely on controlling the reinforced shielding there, something which his best friend didn't seem to mind at all. Not only was Corey more of the commanding type as it was, Trent would be in the hangar and coordinating the entire wave of repair work that they were suddenly going to be burdened with anyway. "Is Malaki at the medical bay?"

"He should be; but don't take too many diverging paths if you happen to not be near the one that he is in" I could tell that he was asking me so that he could have a moment to check in on his husband (if he had the time), and I was more than accepting of that tiny amount of dalliance if he was quick. After all, Connor, Mayu and Katra likely wished that they could have such a moment... But they no longer could. With a soft smile, Trent went running off in the direction that we just came back from, with me nodding at Corey when his mind was asking me whether he should make the shipwide announcement about our change of plans.

"All non-essential engineers, please report to the hangar to repair our ships. I repeat; please report to the hangar if you are non-essential crew. That is thirty million of you, I repeat; that is thirty million of you" Corey lifted up the speaker handed to him by Katra, speaking into it with a clear and confident voice. It undoubtedly supported our troops and fellow pack members to have us three (Corey, Matthias and I) as the main speakers and communicators to our entire movement. Somehow, having a confident and collected voice somehow would remind people that we were good at leading for a reason; giving them hope and courage, even if things seemed to be going to the dogs in every other way. "Please be aware that we are accepting volunteers for the next launch of fighters. If you wish to volunteer, then please wear a red sash somewhere visible on your body; a trained pilot will get to you and teach you the best they can"

Corey hung up the speaker before handing it back to Katra, the somewhat pessimistic look telling me that he didn't think that there were going to be that many that would volunteer for the role. But even if we only got one person, then that was going to one more person to help in our next wave.

"Connor, take Mayu and Sera with you towards the hangar as well. Any extra hands they have will undoubtedly be invaluable" I decided to hand out tasks to the somewhat antsy looking pack members still hanging around (I didn't blame them, suddenly being told to 'act normal' after nearly being blown out of the sky a number of times would make me uncomfortable as well), each one looking grateful to have something to do. With Bobby remaining behind because he hadn't been named before, I quickly indicated that I wanted him specifically to come with me somewhere, before turning to Corey. "I've been thinking-

"Oh boy, here we go" That was the very first sign of Corey joking around, something that only a spare few ever got to see. He didn't have a partner or child to look after, so I considered it to be a big honour that he still joked around with me like he did. "I'm kidding, your plans are generally much better than others. Tell me about it"

I gestured for Corey to come along with me and Bobby, before darting right back out of the bridge. As I left, I could feel a momentary tug in the back of my mind; perhaps Matthias wanting to ask me some kind of burning question. After a bit more investigation I discovered that the burning question likely had to do with Bryan's final moments... Which I didn't have the time to answer right then. We could discuss that to our heart's content (granted that we both survived, considering how easily my fellow pack members seemed to fall in other moments of time) after it all was over.

 _"I was planning on having a better look at our reserve electrical power at the back of the Helicarrier. It may be silly, but if we can momentarily scramble the battlecruiser that keeps sending out that shockwave intermittently, then we'll stand a better chance"_ I explained my reasoning, as frankly I was sick and tired of that cowardly third ship hanging at the back of the battlefield and sneaking in only to be a nuisance. Corey nodded his head, his mind already thinking about how he would be able to do that if he tinkered with the massive power source. It likely was going to be pointless to try a similar shockwave technique from our enemies, but his mind was considering the alternative of sending the extra electricity to our main guns and firing upon the ship that way; which was possibly going to be helpful for both offending battlecruisers.

The three of us darting down those hallways happened to be done at the right time, as we passed by one of the medical wards closest to the hangar. Whether it was because they had detected us or not, Malaki and Jfred both came out, naturally slotting onto our three man group to help us with whatever we were going to do.

 _"The nurse says that she doesn't think that Marvin needs medical treatment, but she wanted to do some extra scans on his lungs to be sure"_ Jfred announced the findings of the nurse in terms of his cousin, as there was the higher chance that he was going to be returning to the battlefield with us instead of my partner. " _As for Paul, a group of five nurses were attending to him when we left just now. While they doubt he's going to be up and ready for action, he got off quite easy in contrast to what might have happened"_

 _"I figured as much"_ I wasn't at all surprised at the prognosis for both men - likely a side effect from working with Amanda for so long, as her talent for initial first aid had always been tremendous - and I quickly filled them in on why we were heading in the opposite direction from all of the others working in the hangar. While there was a slight moment of regret in my mind when I could detect that Malaki had not gotten his special moment with his partner coming by, I knew that I would need their help (more like their tremendous strength) to get everything settled away in that part of the Helicarrier.


	7. In Space; For the Cause

We knew that we were getting close to the specific engine room at the back of the ship the moment the floor changed from its typical reinforced metal into a massive expanse of metal walkways. All of those walkways had been constructed with little bumps and ridges (with express direction coming from Corey and Trent, as the both of them knew a good reason to build them that way) in the remote case that our ship was ever tilted on its side; so that he crew stationed in those engine rooms could always simply lean down and grab onto something to hold on for dear life. Not that it would have been all too useful in that moment of time, as most of our engineers had left for the hangar; leaving just our five unit team to get to work.

Directly in the middle of the engine room was a massive ball of electricity, it crackling and sparking little bits of electricity in different directions as it twisted around. It was contained nicely in our reactor core; a cylinder shaped one that rose high enough in the ship where it could reach anything that it directly needed to go to. Corey already started to head downwards on one of the walkways next to him, before sharply turning right again to end up on the starboard side of our ship.

 _"With me Malaki"_ Corey ordered one of the Alpha to come with him, before directing me with a different set of gestures and pointing to a different station a bit higher on our port side of the ship. Malaki didn't have to really divert himself that much to follow behind the Omega, as the former did have a small predisposed habit of following behind the latter as it was. While we as a pack often remarked to others that we didn't have favourites in our tight-knit group, that was quite bluntly a lie. I naturally had an example of a favourite in the form of my life-long partner, while Malaki often had a preference for Corey (because of his relationship with his best friend, of course), his sister Amanda, Trent and Connor (his first flame, despite the fact neither man really talked much about it)... Except as the leader, I naturally was not supposed to act upon my preference in my pack. _"That control set over there next to you should be the one that measures how much energy goes towards the guns when we fire up this reactor"_

 _"You don't want to send all of the electrical energy to the guns?"_ I could tell that he wasn't comfortable with firing all of our electrical reserve energy at the enemy ship - his immediate nod confirmed that even if I couldn't read his mind - but I had yet to uncover exactly why he wasn't keen on the idea. " _You do know that the guns can take it"_

 _"They can, but even a full blast against that special battlecruiser wouldn't fully bring it down. I'd much rather that we use the majority of our energy on better shielding and repairing so that we can keep this bird afloat"_ Corey's words got reinforced by the next set of gunfire slamming into our shielding, this particular one feeling like it had struck exactly in our localised shielding around our specific engine room; rattling us enough that Bobby had to give me a bit of a hand to regain my balance.

" _You alright?"_ Bobby naturally was worried for me, as my heels weren't exactly the best kind of footwear to try to regain my balance in; even if I didn't have the extra issues of the different floor underneath me. Before long I did have my balance back (I wasn't wearing stiletto heels after all, those would be ridiculous even for me in my platform shoes), and I assured him with my mind that I was fine. He still reluctantly let me go, as frankly he didn't have much to do beyond worrying for my safety, but I was grateful nonetheless to still have him hale and hearty with me.

 _"...Fair enough"_ I reluctantly had to agree that slamming that battlecruiser hiding at the back of the fight would have to come after we ensured that the one firing continued shots at us was handled, even though I was sick and tired of that one slowly picking off members of my group. As I hovered my hands over the set of controls beneath my fingers, I was able to pick out enough information from Corey's mind about how much energy we could give to the guns. After receiving it loud and clear, I dialled up the allowed energy to both of our twin guns (our biggest guns right above our hangar) about fifteen percent each of our electrical power, leaving around seventy percent for the shielding and life support. "Matthias, when we activate the reserved electrical power in the back of the ship, there is going to be quite a bit of kick added to our main guns. I want that shot directly at the battlecruiser that releases electrical waves intermittently"

"You got it" Matthias acknowledged my order, and even my console underneath me quickly told me that the guns were shifting to point in a different direction from before. "The twin guns are pointed over there just in case we can't contain it for long. Don't want it accidentally going to the wrong battlecruiser"

"Or completely missing" Jfred chimed in, as of course he had his own link to our conversation with his commander status. As much as it could have been seen as a joke, we all understood that he was completely serious; that scenario truly would feel like some kind of kick in the teeth.

"Trent, let's coordinate when I'll be activating this reserve electrical energy" Corey didn't look at all concerned that he interrupted Jfred, as it had been the end of the conversation between he, I and his older brother anyway. Even if I couldn't have heard him via the communication vector or from the fact he was only a couple of walkways away from us, I could spy from my position that he was hard at work on his stations; simultaneously trying to prime the electrical power and not immediately overload any nearby systems. "I don't want to interrupt your magnetic shielding after all"

"We've only done one or two bursts right now, but we're doing alright for now" Trent's tone seemed to give the hint that he was giving his best friend the go ahead to start whenever, as we could hear in the background of his communication the reassuring sounds of people welding and repairing ships already. "You don't have to worry about any of our ships coming in afterwards, they're all currently deactivated as it is and we've ensured that they don't take lasting damage even if we were to pull them back in through an electrical shield"

"It does mean that anyone still alive in any fighter might get completely electrocuted when you pull them through" Jfred seemed to still be optimistic that pulling in some of the ships would yield us some injured (but still alive) troops, but the suspiciously quiet response from Trent shot down that hope before it could fully take flight. "...Trent?"

"I'm sorry to sound callous, but I don't think anyone still inside those ships would be alive at this point" Trent sighed, spelling out exactly what I had predicted about the fighters coming in; that nobody inside them had been alive. In a way, it did spell out that one of Corey's worries about people having to pull their dead comrades seemed to be correct, especially with his best friends words to back it up. "So far we've only had around five largely intact ships out of the bunch we pulled in, and nobody survived in those ones either. Even the Viking... Well..."

The following conversation seemed to sink faster than a stone in water, as we could uncover a little too quickly about who's ship that was supposed to be. Tanner's hadn't survived crashing directly into the first turret, so that frankly meant that there was only a single other ship that he could have been referring to... Meaning that they likely had to pull Kevin's body out of his ship.

"Connor and the others didn't have to do it, did they?" As much as it sounded heartless, I was hoping that none of the pack I had sent to help Trent had done the job. Connor and Mayu already had their own internal demons to battle now that their partners weren't there to support them, and Sera had always been such a gentle soul as it was. I needed those three at their best, and that meant that scarring them in such a way was really detrimental in every sense of the word.

"Oh, no. I managed to recognise the ship when it came in, and I kind of... Purposely sent those three to do something else" Trent had been kind enough to divert their attention away, even if those three might not like the fact that their friend had waylaid them. However, it didn't mean that _nobody_ in our pack had done the deed. "He... He actually looked very peaceful, if that helps"

...Peaceful. I did my best to imagine him in a peaceful state, and carefully made sure to override my original last memory of Kevin's final moments. Even if it wasn't true (whether Trent was lying to me or not, I wasn't sure), it was much nicer to think of it like that than the harrowing final message it had originally been.

My mind purposefully thinking that way seemed to bleed over to the other four accompanying me in that engine room, the image in my mind of Kevin's peaceful face flooding their minds as they unconsciously sensed what I was thinking.

"The engine is primed" Corey gently directed our attention back to the electrical engine, which was sparking more often now that it had been primed, almost as though it was growing in excitement now that it was actually going to be used. "It's even going to hold a little bit left in the reactor core, so that it can rebuild and possibly be reused in the battle after a while. I just need to turn off the safety protocols a bit further here, and then you can pull the lever on your right to activate it"

I turned my head to glance at the lever that he was mentioning, seeing that it was a simple lever designed so that someone couldn't accidentally fat finger a keyboard and inadvertently fire the electrical system early. Just as I was going to glance back over to him and give my permission for him to disable the safety protocols, somehow the entire wall behind him seemed to blast right open.

 ** _"_ Warning; Hull breach detected in Engine Room Two" **The ship announced what the problem was long before our frazzled minds could uncover what it was, as of course our attention was focused on not being sucked out the side of the ship from the change in gravity and pressure. **"Localised shielding failure in sector fourteen. Engines three, five and six offline; all non-essential power and life support will shut off in fifty seconds"**

As all of our emergency Oz kits flared into life around our heads, we mainly were scrabbling to try and find some kind of surface to hold onto. I didn't manage to find any kind of purchase on the floor, just barely being caught by Bobby as his hand shot out to catch mine. Jfred was the one who managed to catch him afterwards, as he had managed to find a proper grip in the ridges and catch his cousin around the chest at almost the exact same time. Corey seemed to catch quite the break as well, as Malaki had been a similar anchor to him by grabbing onto a nearby railing and the Omega's leg before either of them could be sucked out into space.

"What's happening back there?!" Matthias' worried question still ended up barking directly into my ears, but I truly didn't have the time to respond to it. It was a monumental task to even pull my arm against the flow of gravity to switch off my device, and it was that indicator which told me that my spur of the moment decision to pass by the medical ward (which ended up getting us Malaki and Jfred back for the time being) had essentially saved our lives. Corey and I likely would have difficulty enough in pulling off some kind of pull-up - even without gravity interference, mind you - and Bobby looked like he was just barely managing to keep me from flying off into space.

"What's the plan guys?!" Jfred asked me, as of course he had his hands completely full with keeping not only his own life, but that of Bobby and I alive. Even as we struggled to pull ourselves into a proper standing position on the walkways, we could hear the ship announcing our dire situation over all of the loud speakers in the Helicarrier.

 **"Warning; all non-essential power and life support will shut off in forty seconds"** What the ship considered to the 'non-essential' was shifty at best, as there was the legitimate possibility that it would only provide life support for the medical wing and the bridge. I wasn't exactly sure how many engineers and pilots in the hangar had Oz kits on them, but I wasn't planning on experimenting to see how many there were.

Corey tilted his head so that he was essentially hanging upside down in the gravity, seeing the blue twinkling lights of the console that held the safety protocols for the electrical engine. It currently was still waiting for his approval (other people could do it as well, but then they'd have to pass through extra steps compared to his executive command), as otherwise the engine would simply shut down if we tried to pull the lever in fear of doing damage to the nearby systems. Even with his hands fully stretched outward, Corey still couldn't reach it, the only thing that he could manage was to flip a switch on his communication vector directly in his ear like I had done. With the rapidly declining time, Corey glanced over to me to make sure that I understood what I had to do after his task was done... And I did.

"Malaki, let go of me" Corey calmly commanded the Alpha holding onto his leg to release him, his voice reverberating all throughout the ship for everyone to hear. I myself was wondering why on Alfu he was doing so, while Malaki naturally was looking at the Omega with a completely aghast look (I wasn't, mainly cause I had a strong feeling that his plan was one that I knew) but Corey was able to calmly counter him before he could even protest against the idea. It even sounded like he was making a final impassioned speech to everyone else waiting within the ship... And good lord above, leave it up to him to weaponise his final moments to rally our troops. "If you don't let me go, then everyone is going to die. Forget looking Trent in the face to tell him about what happened to me, you won't be able to look him in the eyes at all... Let me be the hero for once"

**"Warning; all non-essential power and life support will shut off in thirty seconds"**

Malaki grimaced with that remark, his thoughts clearly conveying the hurt and sharp sting that it brought to him. But even as he thought that, he knew the Omega was right... And reluctantly decided to release him.

Corey quickly shot down towards the console through the pull of gravity, banging into one particular railing on the way with one of his shoulders. But even that couldn't stop him, as he twisted around just in time to slam his hand on the console as he went flying past; the sound of the machine softly ringing in acknowledgement being the final thing that he heard before he shot out into the vast expanse of space outside of our ship.

" _Jfred, drop Bobby and I in such a way that Malaki can catch us. After that, you need to crawl up the walkway and pull the lever"_ I ordered Jfred next, and I could already feel the Alpha shifting his body slightly so that we would have an easier time to reach the now open handed Alpha below him. He didn't hesitate in letting us go when he felt that Malaki had enough time to prepare (he didn't dare risk waiting too long, as that would make Corey's entire sacrifice feel completely like it had been a waste), my startled thoughts acting as warning enough that we were going to come rushing past.

" _Holy sh-_

 _"Gotcha!"_ Malaki caught the both of us surging past easily, trapping the both of us against his chest in a tight bear hug. I could feel that even if the plan had been for the two of us to go shooting out that Malaki would refuse to do so, especially after he had already felt the heavy weight of letting Corey go.

A massive electric ball seemed to burst into life outside of our ship, and I felt like if I had my communication vector on that I would have heard Blaire announcing that Corey's life signs had flat-lined; the proud man determined to go out in a blaze of glory, taking out several helicopters that still lingered around the place. Jfred's grimace appearing on his face said that my guess about the announcement was right, but he still did his best to steadily climb up the walkway towards the lever, his muscles doing plenty against the pull of gravity and pressure compared to the rest of us.

**"Warning; all non-essential power and life support will shut off in-**

The announcement got cut off the moment Jfred's superior muscles wailed on the lever against the wall, sharply slamming it down as far as it could go. A split second later the electric ball of energy in the middle of our reactor pulsed in a massive way, before shooting off into differing parts of the ship. Within seconds the ship got most of their engines started back up again, whirring proudly beneath us. That wasn't all, as the massive electrical shield that covered our ship seemed to fix the massive hull breach directly behind us, acting as a kind of barrier to prevent the inevitable pull of space.

With our gravity and air returning a second later, all four of our remaining pack members in that room ended up thudding against the walkways, with Malaki purposefully angling himself so that he ended up landing on his back while protecting us. Bobby had some ample wriggle room, so he was just able to stick one of his beefy arms behind Malaki's head to prevent any sort of concussion to the latter. While there was a spike of pain coming from Bobby because of his arm slamming into the walkway, the damage was minimal compared to what it could have been.

"Matthias, we had a hull breach over here, but we've gotten it sorted out" I realised that I was glossing over a lot of the details when I managed to contact him after that stressful half a minute, but we didn't have time to really spend on giving long situation report compared to simple instructions. "The electrical power has been activated, but we will need to get both the localised shielding and hull fixed over here"

"I'll send about five million of my engineer’s back that way, as we don't really have to worry about the helicopters outside our hangar anymore" Trent slotted in for leading the engineers, despite the fact he didn't sound as confident as Corey had been. But I was confident in our followers; they would come through for us, especially if they were listening to Corey's final words. "They'll fix things up, and we have plenty of people here in the hangar repairing ships"

"Mila, I want you to return with your five- I mean, four man team" Matthias ordered me back the moment he had some room to talk without interrupting someone, and I couldn't miss the slight flub in his sentence. It seemed he was just as disgruntled with steadily readjusting the amount of numbers of people that remained, and of course that was because of the growing list of casualties rather than anything else. In the background of his communication I could hear the heavy punch of our twin guns firing upon the enemy, and I truly hoped that the bastards starting all of this conflict would choke on the electrical energy overloading their ship.

"Understood" I responded simply to his instructions, before carefully standing up from Malaki's arms. Trying my best to not glance out of the massive hole outside of the electrical shield protecting us, I helped Bobby by extending a hand to help him up. "How are you three doing?"

"I..." Malaki was understandably reluctant to speak of what had just happened, even when he could see all of the good that his decision had made. He didn't even seem reassured when Jfred jogged over towards us, and Bobby's mute nod (as he knew that he had to file away his grievances for when the fighting was over) didn't seem to help either. "...Was there any other way?"

"No, there wasn't" Despite the fact that my mind heavily disagreed with that blunt answer, I still said it. Even though I thought along the same lines as him - that I wished for another alternative - choices rarely could be undone after they had been made and acted upon. You often had to accept that you had made up your mind, and truly wear it; something that I knew quite well, but it seemed to be a new concept for Malaki in that instance. "You made the right decision, even if it doesn't feel like it"

Just like when Corey had ordered for him to let go of him, Malaki looked like he wanted to counter that remark... Before mulling it over in his mind and deciding to not say what he was thinking of. He understood that I was often in a position like he just had been, so he decided to trust more in my judgement rather than the morals that he had grown up with.

"We should be getting back to the bridge" Understandably, Jfred was more than eager to get away from that place. With a short signal of permission coming from my mind, he ended up acting as the vanguard for our group heading back; with Bobby, Malaki and I following quite close behind him.

As we ran back through our familiar corridors, it felt empty to have a missing party member. But even more within my mind, I found myself unconsciously sticking a bit closer to both Alpha, as I knew just how lucky I... We had gotten because of those two coming with us at the last minute. Our distracted minds were likely the reason why we didn't stop by the medical ward to check up on Paul and Marvin (we didn't have time as it was, Marvin would have to come find us once he was ready anyway), charging right on past to the bridge.

We didn't look all that much different in the short time we had been away, but I felt as though I had been through the wringer. It seemed that I wasn't the only one, as Matthias seemed to break typical protocol by coming over to us and wrapping all four of us in as wide of a hug as he could manage with his thin Beta frame.

"Oh thank the lord" He let loose an extremely relieved whisper directly into his cousin's shoulder, as my communication vector being switched off had likely worried him for a bit that all five of us had been lost in that chaos. Matthias' informal behaviour naturally caused both girls sitting at their stations to peel away for a brief second, with Blaire going towards her husband while Katra came over to me.

"We're alright Matt" Bobby reassured his cousin, but that naturally didn't fix every worry in the others mind. I was extremely relieved that none of the other people on the bridge were giving us dirty looks, as they likely could understand that we were all as close as could be.

"I know, I just... I know"

When Matthias peeled himself away, Blaire carefully nestled herself into her husband's reassuring arms while Katra bundled me up into larger frame, her faux-fur collar being soft and reassuring somehow despite the circumstances. It seemed that we weren't the only ones to be hugged however, as the door to the bridge opened behind us, with Sera's surprised gasp alerting us to their presence further.

"Bobby!" Sera cried, both in the literal and figurative sense as she threw her arms around his broad shoulders. Even though there was a note of his typical baritone laughter in her dramatic reunion with him, I could feel in his mind that he was endlessly relieved to survive and come back to her.

"When I heard the announcement over the ship speakers, I thought..." Trent started to speak to his husband, but seemed to lose his nerve as he seemed to be overcome by emotions at seeing the other alright. Malaki seemed to hesitate ever so slightly in actually moving forward to hold his husband however, as of course he was worried about how he was supposed to explain what had happened to his best friend... But of course with our pack link, Trent could easily read his mind; and there was no way that he was going to blame the other for that decision. "...Come here"

Connor and Mayu lingered a bit uncertainly near the center of everyone reuniting with each other, as their partners... Weren't there to reunite with. Instead, Katra did her usual flamboyant thing to twirl her and I a bit around, so that she was able to rope both singular people into our own little group in the centre. With a soft laugh coming from those two, I gladly held onto them.

Just as I was beginning to think that was everyone, we heard the door open one more time. When our heads collectively turned to see who it was, we were endlessly relieved to see that it was Marvin, standing there with a sheepish grin and all.

"I don't suppose you have room for one more, despite how self-sacrificing I was being earlier?" He cracked a soft joke, one that seemed to go well over with us all. It wasn't quite a strong Kevin joke, but it was fine; we loved seeing him up and about with somewhat of a spring in his step. Marvin laughed even further when several of us gently grabbed him, the lot of us remaining there all coming together into one giant hug. There was one final person missing from our thirteen strong pack, but there was some kind of mental link coming through that I could detect strongly. "But despite everything going on right now, I do have some good news"

Pain. Pain, pain and more pain; that was the thing coming through loud and clear through our mental pack link, and people naturally were glancing at Marvin first simply because he was the last person to file into the room. He shook his head, softly indicating that it wasn't him that was radiating that feeling to the rest of us. Just as I was going to glance over at Bobby for his banged up arm, did I hear a heavy sound coming from right outside the bridge... A _thunk,_ as though someone was systematically trying to bang something into the floor.

"He insisted on getting here by himself" As though they were some kind of duo act, Marvin's words ended exactly as the door to the bridge opened one final time. Somewhat hurriedly hobbling his way into the room was Paul, who seemed to struggle moving his one remaining leg alongside the crutches that he had pilfered from the medical ward. When he finally made it far enough into the room for the door to be able to close behind him, he came to a halt, before nervously resting on his crutches and giving us all a lopsided salute.

"Reporting for duty" Paul smugly announced his arrival, even while his mind was practically buzzing with nothing but signals of burning pain running up his spine. While part of me honestly wanted to smack him across the face for blatantly ignoring his body's warning signals, I couldn't help myself from pulling apart from the group and holding him close to me. He naturally flinched as his body shifted to lean on me instead of the crutches, but underneath the throbbing sting was the warmth that came from his feelings of love.

"Paul, what in the actual holy heavens are you doing?!" Matthias took over the responsibility for chastising the pilot, as he could clearly see that I didn't have the heart to do so myself.

"Don't need two legs to fly a ship" He chuckled in response, trying his best to not focus on the searing pain from his missing lower limb. While he certainly was correct, most ships only needed a set of hands to work, it was worrisome to let someone who seemed like they were going to faint from the pain behind the cockpit of a ship. "Besides, morphine would just dull my senses"

"And you seriously think being completely up to your eyeballs in adrenaline is any better?" Connor grumbled, looking at the mess that was one of his best friends. As much as I didn't like it either, it would be a vast improvement to have our best pilot back out on the battlefield along with us. With some trepidation in my mind, I carefully pulled Paul off my shoulders so that I could look him in the eyes, giving him the sternest look I could manage at the time.

"Don't you even dare about pulling off any more 'heroic stunts'" I warned him, letting him know that I wasn't at all going to relent on my viewpoint. With that confident smirk that I both knew and loved in equal amounts, he knew quite well that there was no way he would have risked his life anyway... Not after our promise to each other when I had joined the movement after all.

"I wouldn't even dream of it"


	8. Tearing Apart the Sky

Despite Paul's initial claims that he would be 'totally fine' to get to the hangar without assistance, Jfred wasn't having any of it. With our pain stricken pilot easily lifted up by the Alpha, we left Matthias, Blaire and Katra securely in the bridge before heading back to our growing army in the hangar.

" _I must admit, I'm kind of worried that we might not have enough support from the engineers"_ Mayu admitted to the rest of us, as she had been sticking around in the hangar long enough before to see how many people were wearing red sashes on their body. If her memories were an indicator either way, then she really hadn't seen all that many before the four of them darted off to the bridge. _"I could count the amount that I had spotted there on a single hand"_

I had a hope in the back of my mind however, especially when I considered the fact that her recollection was before Corey's announcement had been made over the intercom. If they had listened, then perhaps...

When the doors opened to let our group of ten into the hangar, we were met with a tidal wave of red. Every single engineer in sight seemed to proudly display the red sashes on their bodies, and the same people would turn and quickly give us a salute when they realised that they had caught our attention so. In fact, the only reason that not all of the engineers were being trained was because there weren't enough pilots to go around; the engineers far outnumbered them.

 _"I don't think we have to worry about that at all"_ I proudly told the others, smiling wide at any engineer who even so much as glanced in my direction. The people in our movement were extraordinary people, and this was just another example of that. _"Trent, lead the way back to our ships please"_

Trent obliged quite happily, easily ducking and weaving between the hordes of ships that had been brought in by the magnetic pulls that they had done while the rest of us had our hands full. Closer towards the front of the hangar doors themselves were our larger ships, with the Valkyrie and Banshee perfectly fixed up and looking like they hadn't even seen a glimpse of the fight just yet.

 _"You managed to save my baby!"_ Paul was ecstatic to see the Vulture in one piece as well, with the cut off engines being reattached and the nose being fixed so that it no longer was crumpled into mush. I could still spy a number of little issues such as a dented panel here and a tiny tear in the outside armour there, but they likely had been put off in favour of repairing other ships that were in worse condition.

 _"Barely, the thing nearly exploded on us before the emergency protocol droids put out the fire"_ Trent light-heartedly told off Paul, as both men knew equally well that Paul had done the best he could in the situation, all things considered.

As Paul was placed delicately in the cockpit of the Vulture by Jfred and others began to pick out some of the smaller fighters arranged around our ships, I noticed that Marvin wandered a bit off to the left of those allocated ships... Before coming to a halt and staring at the Viking that proudly stood there for someone else. Trent and the other engineers had been kind enough to move the bodies of their fallen comrades somewhere else, but the ship was still symbolically acting as a tombstone for his brother.

 _"...Marvin"_ I sighed internally, as I could tell that he wasn't going to like what I was going to tell him next. He smiled sadly at me, one of his hands coming up to gently rest on a smooth part of the ship in an affectionate gesture to the ship that held his brother's life in his hands.

 _"I know; you want me to pilot the Valkyrie"_ Marvin regretfully had to agree that it wasn't wise for him to be piloting the Viking, as nobody could pilot the Valkyrie as well as he could. But even so, he still seemed to linger for a long time there, as though he was expecting someone to come climbing out of the construct and making an odd joke. _"I guess it's just... Seeing this here, it..."_

 _"It finally makes it hit home, doesn't it?"_ I asked him, and the sharp nod from him couldn't hide the moisture from appearing in his eyes. There wasn't much I could say to him by that point that he couldn't already pick out from my mind, instead settling for giving him a warm hug as a small respite. Unlike the others, he was already feeling the brunt of not only losing several pack members, but the fact that two of them had been his brothers made it come hanging over his head like a dark cloud. Gently wrapping his arms around my petite frame, I could hear the shaky sigh that escaped his lips, as well as feeling that ever so strong desire that he just wanted this all to be _over_ so that he could grieve.

 _"I'll take good care of it"_ Jfred soon came over to join us, already being able to feel what had happened in his absence. While Jfred wasn't our best pilot, I still felt confident in leaving it's heavier weaponry over to him. After somewhat roughly pulling the both of us into one of his gigantic hugs as always, the timid laughter coming from Marvin seemed to say that he appreciated both of his cousin’s gestures.

 _"Honestly, I don't want any special treatment to the ship"_ That remark was a lie; Jfred and I could both feel that in Marvin's mind. Even so, we knew there likely was a good reason for his words, and they became clear with his very next sentence. _"Just come back safe to us at the end of all of this, and I'll consider that good enough for me"_

 _"I'll do you one better; I'll come back alive and I'll keep the ship safe. Mark my words"_ Jfred still was as confident and bull-headed as ever, even with the thoughts of our missing pack members well and truly being in the back of his mind. That part of him, the one that assured the two of us Omega hearing him, was just as great as it had always been. With a three way fist bump (one that Jfred took great care to do gently, just like he always would), the three of us there were bolstered for the fight, even if it was for a small portion of time.

With the sirens announcing that the third and final wave of our fighters were going to be launching shortly, we quickly darted off to our differing ships. Marvin and I got back into the seats of the ships we knew very well, and Paul confidently started up his Vulture until it started to hover in place between our bigger and bulkier ships. Before long Jfred also started up the bulky Viking, and like our own little squadron of busy bees; Sera, Mayu, Connor, Malaki and Bobby were zipping around in their smaller fighters. Trent gave us one final salute from his spot on the ground, before turning around and getting stuck into the monumental task of running the remaining twenty-five million engineers that were aboard the Helicarrier.

**"Final wave of launchers shall be deployed in three... two..."**

"Make them fear retribution!" I sharply commanded that to the pilots and newly fledged troops all hovering place, speaking over the announcement of the ship to give everyone a good sharp morale boosting effect. My own words acted as the final count to the command, with the shielding dropping in front of the hangar just a second later. With no helicopters hanging around outside our ship, everyone stormed out in their mass of flying instruments of death, paying special attention to that massive gun that was momentarily disengaged from firing at our shield instead.

With our group of nine closely clustered together, we headed directly towards the massive gun that had been causing problems ever since the battlecruiser had managed to turn around. No more helicopters seemed to arrive either from it or the third battlecruiser, so I watched on in glory at the massive gun seemed to swivel around in confusion at the massive wave of fighters that were trailing behind us.

"Everyone in the fighters, start searching for any kind of weak points on the ship; I'd like to find something to exploit after we're done with their weaponry" I ordered the five people in our fighters hovering around, and I quickly got five different acknowledgements before they split off from the four of still moving in a pack. Even though that massive gun wasn't the only kind of weaponry stationed on that ship, I knew that their smaller fighter models were better built for scouting and a steady build-up of attacks rather than fighting a massive hulking piece of weaponry. "Paul, act as a distraction for the turret in case it turns to fire on Marvin, Jfred or I"

"Aye aye ma'am!" Paul cheerfully answered my call (perhaps a bit too excitedly, as I had a feeling that he was over playing it to show that he was fine), his smaller ship darting around like a hornet to distract the turret before the person aiming it could overcome their initial shock at our massive amount of troops still left. "Hey, you big lug! Remember me?"

The person aiming the turret did in fact remember him; as the moment it seemed to register that Paul was the exact same person that had been annoying him before, it seemed to frantically go after him with heavy shots of ammunition. It was a little funny, like seeing a human who was so busy trying to swat one little fly compared to the bear sneaking up on it.

With its attention distracted for the time being, Jfred fired one of the two remaining black star missiles against it, as my ship wasn't built to deal with astronomically large shielding. Marvin quickly backed him up however, launching several volleys of bombs from his ship as he flew directly overhead it.

"Shielding has dropped down to about fifteen percent" Marvin reported after his fly-by attack, which left just enough room for me to do some damage with the weapons that I had been equipped with. "Do some damage Mila!"

He didn't have to tell me twice; I already pushed the Banshee in my hands as fast as it could go, looking like I was going to be ramming it directly. At the very last second (like a game of chicken that Paul had often taught me how to play properly) I veered away, so that the underside of my Banshee was able to fling one end of an electric coil against the side of the gun. With the built up acceleration that I had built up, I managed to quickly zip fully around the circumference of the gun in a spiral pattern; with the turret turning in confusion at my frantic movements.

Once my coil wrapped tightly around the turret three times over I pushed a button for my Banshee to let go of the other end of it, completing the circuit so that electric buzzed through the massive snaking metal rope. I took absolute glee in the bright white sparks that seemed to shoot out in every direction from the coil, frying not only the final remaining shielding that was pitifully protecting it but also seemingly shutting down the controls behind it; making it about as effective as a useless hood ornament.

"Jfred, Marvin, Hotel formation!" I called for the other two heavy ships to come support me, as I sharply pulled off a double hammerhead movement so that I was heading right back to the turret.

"On it!"

"I got your back!"

The two of them nicely fit alongside me as we began to fly overhead the turret once more, the two of them just barely managing to not clip my own (admittedly large) wings. And as we had always been trained in our own special Hotel formation, as we flew over the turret we each dropped our own special kinds of bombs onto it; Jfred's being a pitch black, mine being a bright blue and Marvin's being a bright red. Even as we easily cleared the reach of our bombs, we could still clearly see the bright colours flashing by as each one did it's work; Jfred's bomb imploding, Marvin's exploding and mine finally disintegrating anything that remained after the first two decimated the structure.

"WAHOOO!!!" Jfred's cry of excitement wasn't only effective in making our own pack have their morale skyrocket, but I could hear from the ever so slight interference that he had turned on his special commander communication vector to give the message loud and clear to the rest of his troops; that the enemy battlecruiser was ripe for the picking.

With that message coming through loud and clear, the fighters that had been hanging back in the meantime all came rushing past us, eager to do some damage now that we had cleared the way for them. Things weren't completely clear for us - as smaller cannons on top of the battlecruiser started to come into life to replace their missing artillery - but they certainly were looking up compared to our dicey situation from before.

"Matthias, do you have an estimation of how long the battlecruiser hanging around at the back is going to be out of commission?" I started to weight up which battlecruiser was better for us to be taking care of now that there was no clear difference between either in terms of how dangerous they were. The one hiding away still was an anomaly in terms of what their technology was (sort of like us in a way, as we certainly had a number of things up our sleeves), but there was enough weaponry still on going in that other battlecruiser that I wasn't fine in just abandoning it.

"From what our scanners have picked up from here, it's going to be down for another twenty minutes" Matthias informed me, and he already seemed to predict what my following question was going to be. It had been eighteen years since we first started to work together in the Prevention of Widespread Chaos, but he still was just as coherent and intelligent as he was when I had first met him. "As for our reserve electrical energy, that might take upwards of an hour to recharge and hit them again"

"Roger, we'll be focusing on eliminating the battlecruiser over here in front of the Helicarrier first then" I quickly informed him of at least what my pack was going to be doing, carefully steering my Banshee through the hordes of fighters flying all around me and firing upon the outer layers of armour on the enemy ship. It felt like it was going to take woefully long to take care of that, so I switched my talking over to the five pilots searching over the battlecruiser to learn more about our enemy. "How is it going in scanning the battlecruiser guys?"

"I've-

Connor's attempt to explain what he had found got cut woefully short, as the moment after someone had pressed their button the sound of a loud cannon shot cut through all forms of explanation. In the corner of my field of vision I could spy one particular fighter struggling to right their ship while it floundered in space, before it got fired upon again by a smaller cannon on top of the battlecruiser, sending the entire ship up in a fiery explosion. While I knew it had to belong to one of my own pack - I was only connected with them on that frequency after all - I had no idea who it was going to be until Blaire would chime in.

"...Sera's life signs have flat-lined" Blaire's regretful announcement spelled out exactly what had happened in the meantime. For a short bit we were completely taken by surprise, as it had been so... Unexpected compared to most of the other deaths we had experienced during that war.

"I thought you took out the main turret?!" Bobby's absolutely horrified words seemed to be the first one to punch through the silence, as there was no way that he could have remained silent on the matter. Even worse was the fact that the others had likely not seen what I had, so to them it truly came out of left wing in every sense of the word.

"We did Bobby, that wasn't what did the damage" I reminded him that there was absolutely no way that the large turret had managed to hurt her, as even if it had still been up and running, Paul was still zipping around hale and hearty in contrast to her fighter. "It was... It was a stray shot from one of the cannons that happened to hit the underside of her fighter"

Something told me that was even worse for him to hear. Everyone else who had died could proudly say in the afterlife that they had completely given their life for the cause (even Kevin, who likely hadn't expected his fate either), so it stung even more when people really took in this news... The mere fact that she had died due to poor luck stung more than anything else.

"...I've found a faulty thruster at the back of the battlecruiser" Despite the fact he likely thought that he was sounding like he was interrupting at a bad time, Connor returned to explaining what he had found. If there was a way to destroy this battlecruiser faster and with less casualties, then we really needed to take it; hurt feelings be darned. "One of the rear thrusters is off, and it looked like it's old enough to be a tube system engine"

"If it's anything like the bloated one we had been on before, then that's true" Mayu backed up Connor's claim, as she likely had seen first-hand on her husband’s map how the inside of the other battlecruiser looked like. That didn't surprise me in the slightest; as these Alpha had never seemed to intend to fight a space worthy battle, so they were quite outdated in most of their technology (or perhaps more accurately, they stuck all of their upgrades on a single battlecruiser like the fools they were). "A smaller thruster would likely only fit a tiny ship like Paul's, but a larger one may even fit the Valkyrie"

"I think I managed to get a look at the one that Connor is talking about; it's a larger one at the corner of the rear stern" Malaki talked next, before his fighter sent out a special indicator that showed that he was wanting us all to converge on his location. Marvin, Jfred and I had to carefully filter through the school of fighters to be able to head to the stern of that battlecruiser, and Paul soon re-joined us once we were clear of any sort of smaller cannon firing at us.

Our three bulkier ships were naturally the last ones to arrive at the rear of the ship, but it soon seemed quite obvious which our comrades were talking about once we hovered there as a nine... Eight man unit. The battlecruiser had eight smaller thrusters and four large ones, with the faulty one being the top right one (quite obviously so, since it was the only one not brightly lit up with a white emission fire). While it certainly did look big enough to easily take everything up to Marvin's Valkyrie, Jfred and I wouldn't have an easy time following any of them considering our ships had wide wings on them.

"Looks like Mila and I are going to be acting as support while you guys go inside" Jfred could notice what I had already observed, as naturally he wasn't as confident as Paul or Marvin to really be piloting a big ship through the engine ducts of a ship. "After all, as one may say; we have a lot of junk in our trunks"

"...You wish" Bobby eventually decided to speak up, even if it was only to utter that he really didn't think Jfred or I had particularly curvy rear ends. Not just in terms of the ships we were piloting (after all, we were wider at the middle rather than the back), but many years ago in a silly game of truth or dare it had been determined that Jfred and I were about on par on that type of thing; we were not moving a lot in our caboose. Even though there was the slight hint of exasperation in Bobby's voice, he could tell that Jfred had told it to try and lift the mood, so he was doing his best to not dampen the mood (especially considering the fact that Mayu and Connor were in his exact position at the time, so he likely felt that he didn't have the right to gripe any louder than they were doing).

"Ignoring the fact that Jfred and Mila aren't exactly bodacious babes-

"Hey, I disagree with that heavily!"

"You don't count; you're in a relationship with one of them" Marvin easily ended up cutting Paul off just like the other pilot had done to him, which only earned him an exaggerated gasp from the latter. I couldn't help but note that Paul's voice did actually sound like it was trying to hold back some sort of indication of pain, but I wasn't about to lecture him on taking morphine or something similar while we were in battle. "As I was saying, there may actually be a way for the other two to come with us. Do you see how weak the structural integrity of the metal sheeting in the tubing looks?"

Some of us gently flew just a tad upwards to see what he was getting at, and it was true; the metal sheeting in the tube looked incredibly flimsy, like papier-mache rather than a strong metal construct. Most of the reinforced part of the tubing had come from years and years of extra metal layers being added on rather than removing them and upgrading the base layer, so it also meant that their engines weren't as strong as they could have been without that addition.

"If we go in based on size and steadily shoot off bits of the metal sheeting then we may have enough room for them to come with us!" Mayu quite excitedly realised Marvin's plan, even testing it a little with the guns on her fighter. The metal sheeting came crumbling off extremely easily, which seemed to relieve the others to no end... While Jfred and I were more uncertain about it.

"...I'm just saying, you can't complain about my flying being terrible if I go into that thing" Jfred nervously cracked a joke, to which several others in our group softly laughed at. It was when Paul went into the tube first - firing precision lasers all the while - that the younger Frederick brother realised that everyone was one hundred percent serious, even though Jfred was arguably our worst flyer in the pack (he still was better than the average citizen though, don't get that confused). "Guys, this is actually really dangerous for Mila and I"

"It's going to save far more lives though" Connor reasoned with the suddenly nervous Alpha before he went in directly after Paul, firing continuously at the walls just like his friend was doing all the way in. After all of our fighters went in after them and Marvin followed after them that we had to make up our minds.

"...For the Prevention of Widespread Chaos" I softly chanted that to myself, but Jfred could hear it as well. With some trepidation and all of my focus being directed to keeping my Banshee as straight as I could possibly manage, I steered the ship into the dark looking tube. "May the lord watch over me"

"Amen" Jfred agreed with me, and I was reassured majorly to soon see his Viking follow right behind me into the tunnel; being not only a pack member but platonic soulmate to the ends of the universe with me. And so, all eight of us ventured into the belly of the beast once more.


	9. In Space; The Final Cry

It likely would have been immensely frightening for whoever was manning that particular engine room, as long before we had reached the end of the tubing system that we were flying through, there were still a number of times that our ships banged or scraped through the metal. We certainly were the largest ever creations to slink through them, and we were far more dangerous than a bunch of rats could be.

"I spot a weak point in the tubing ahead! Make sure to blast it open as much as you can so that Mila and Jfred have enough room!" Paul called out from his leading position, before sending his Vulture on a complete nose dive through a perforated part of the tube. As the nose of his ship crashed downwards out of the system, light from the actual ship flooded in and threatened to blind us following behind him.

Connor was next, firing a large burst of laser fire at the same location to widen out the hole just a bit so that he and his fellow fighter pilots wouldn't be scraping their fragile machinery. Bobby followed directly afterward, even pulling off an impressive movement by twirling in a circular motion while firing one of his weapons, opening the hole wide enough so that Marvin wouldn't have any problem. Mayu didn't manage to fire her laser burst, as she had already used hers in large amounts on the tubing to help Jfred and I out, while Malaki had to focus on not speeding up too much (or slowing down too much, lest he get rear ended by Marvin coming after him) as he came crashing out after her.

The momentary worry building up in the back of my mind didn't come to fruition at all, with Marvin firing another volley of bombs at the exact moment he went through the gap in the tubing. While my Banshee did momentarily warn me about the increased heat coming from the fiery explosion of Marvin's payload, it and the shielding took the short excursion of fire like a champ; my ship triumphantly making an entrance into the massive engine room like a phoenix being reborn. There was a faint sound of scraping directly behind me, but thankfully it just sounded like a small scrape on one side of the Viking's wings (likely from Jfred oversteering in one direction), before his ship also appeared relatively unscathed.

A large horde of Alpha got the fright of our lives when we appeared, as the majority of them seemed to be scrambling around in that room from the very moment that Paul had dived directly in. Each subsequent ship coming through would have made their heart beat skyrocket into dangerous levels, and that was long before I had arrived; as some of the more ship savvy members in their sprawling numbers would undoubtedly recognise that my ship was great in dealing with little pockets of infantry.

"Salvo of missiles are locking on to our opponents" I announced to my troops loosely flying that my ship was locking onto several people even as we spoke, which was likely going to be taking up a large percentage of my time as we wrought destruction through their ship. My ship was built for infiltrating and doing quick strikes against enemies, but at the very least I could hear Jfred's guns start to activate and fire upon the Alpha at the same time. As my missiles launched in a wide spray and turned my enemies into a red gory mist where they stood, I started to hand out tasks to the different members of my pack that were flying around. "Mayu, can you figure out the best way for us to bring this ship down? Escaping the ship is a secondary objective, but if it lines up with the previous task then bump up the priority"

"Understood Mila; scanning the battlecruiser as we speak" Mayu reported that she was getting right onto her task, her little fighter doing broad sweeps around the massive room to get the most coverage of the ship without separating from us. "It won't take long considering it is essentially the same map as the bloated one we had been on earlier, but I'll let you know shortly on any changes"

"Should I be switching my Viking to the ground based variant? I'm not hitting much over here" Jfred asked me, as the majority of his minigun bullets were flying wide of their mark and slamming into the wall of the engine room rather than hitting an opponent like my missiles were doing. But even so, the transformation process of his ship wasn't something to sneeze at; it had led to several deaths of untrained pilots in the past when they had created the machine in the military.

"You're better off not doing that" Malaki warned his fellow Alpha, as he knew just as well the dangers behind doing such a risky manoeuvre; he had been one of the first to volunteer for the position of Viking flyer... Only to realise that he really wasn't suitable for the task. "Not only were Tanner and Kevin the only ones who trained to do that correctly, you won't be able to follow behind us easily if we have to leave this room. It's also not really built for how Alpha typically move"

Jfred muttered slightly under his breath about how he likely could handle the transformation process easily, but obeyed the fact that I hadn't given him permission to casually switch between the two settings. Even so, I filed away the possibility of using it in the back of my mind, but only in that specific folder of information that could only be used in extreme situations. Right as my Banshee was busy unloading it's second wave of missiles, Mayu reported back in with her findings on the ship.

"Mila, there is an immediate possibility for taking down this battlecruiser!" She excitedly started to chatter over the intercom, obviously finding something that not only was a sure-fire way of handling this enemy craft but also including an escape route out for us. "Two rooms towards the bow of this battlecruiser is one the main engines for this ship, as it has multiple to account for the big guns and weaponry all over this craft. Because the two big turrets have been handled, most of their left over power has likely gone right back to the main engines, which will make it easy to overload it!"

"That's neat, but how would we be able to get out of this ship if we do that?" Connor asked, even as he followed after Mayu's fighter; which was steering itself to a closed set of double doors. The two of them started to fire their precision lasers against the sturdy construct, but they likely weren't going to get very far themselves at that rate. "Even if we were to turn tail and come right back the same way out of the engine tubes, most of us would likely still be in the ship the very moment it burst into flames"

"My scanner detected a weak point in the roof of the engine room I am talking about, sort of like how we discovered that the tubing had weakened layers" Mayu was patient enough with him, as he could understand not wanting to lose any more people from getting trapped in a battlecruiser as it blew up. One person being lost in that way was enough, even if they weren't your partner. "We likely could blow it up with the upgraded weapons that Mila and Jfred are bringing into the mix, although it may somewhat weaken the blast of the engine"

"That's still better than the alternative of doing nothing" Bobby seemed to settle for the idea, even if it was kind of shaky in his eyes. I did find myself wondering why that one part of the engine room would have a structural weak point, as even the most careless of Alpha would have gotten that fixed the moment they saw it. After accessing my own scanner for a moment to probe the ship for information, I was able to combine both the location and my earlier sighting of Sera's final stand to realise that it had been the exact same location that the bulk of her fighter had crashed into after being blown up... I decided that it was best to not bring it up unless someone were to ask about it later.

"Make way for the heavy ammunition" Marvin ordered our smaller fighters out of the way as he, I and Jfred gathered towards the door that Mayu and Connor were attempting to blow up. They both obediently peeled away from the location, with the former once again focusing her attention to her scanner to make sure that she wasn't missing anything in our new assault plan, while the latter re-joined Malaki and Bobby in stopping the spare few Alpha who dared to come into the room on the other side. "I've still got a single explosive bomb like the one I used against the turret with you guys. Should I keep it for a later time?"

"No, use it now" I ordered him to use it as I turned my attention to the thick door standing in our way. We couldn't really take the chance of taking a long time to open the door - not only because it would be bad for our twenty million fighters going at it outside, but also because it could lead to our pack not being able to complete our mission. "I'd much rather that we use it now, rather than keep it and realise that we should have used it"

"Aye aye Mila" Marvin acknowledged my order, and I did the common courtesy of pulling my ship back ever so slightly so that it wouldn't be pulled into the blast at all. Jfred copied me a second later, which then allowed Marvin to fire the single red bomb still contained in his ship's ammunition slot. With the added fire power, the door standing in our way quickly got flung forwards in a singular crumpled package, landing harmlessly out of the way like the universe's most pitiful paper aeroplane.

It only took a single glance to realise that Mayu's description of a room hadn't truly been literal in terms of the direction we were heading, as the door opened to nothing more than a big hallway leading to another big room akin to the engine one we had reached in the first place. With the vague remnants of Alpha in that room also seemingly running away like frightened rats at the sight of our weaponry (honestly, they seemed to only have bravado when it suited them), it was child's play to soar through the short expanse of hallway to our next location.

"I've still got one my implosive weaponry on hand" Jfred was effectively asking me for permission to use one of his two remaining ones now that he had seen me give Marvin leeway to use them when necessary. It was good that he mentioned them, as I had been keeping a tally of several things at that time; meaning that there was only such much of my brain that I could allocate to remembering exactly how much ammunition people still held on them.

"If you've got one more black star missile on hand, then you are free to use your implosive bomb" I informed him, as I had the loose threads of a plan coming together yet again. Like a spider's web, I needed all pieces of string to make a web to trap our enemies in, so that meant that I truly needed him to understand what I was telling him even if he did not quite understand _why_ I was saying one thing but meaning another. "Absolutely do not use your black star missile until I tell you to, understand?"

"Roger that, I won't..." Jfred had picked a somewhat poor time to acknowledge my strict command, as half of his words got drowned out by the sound of his pitch black bomb utterly crumpling the next door that lay in our way. Even so, I supposed that he understood what I was telling him, even if I had only managed to hear half of his message.

After that door was out of our way, I was the very first to storm through the opening with my Banshee. Perhaps it was a sense of impatience fueling me, but it didn't truly matter by that point as the very next room was completely empty despite Mayu's description of how vital it was to keeping the enemy's battlecruiser afloat.

In terms of size this room clearly had gotten an upgrade compared to the simple hallway we had just stormed through, looking like it's winding engine parts and tubing reached all the way up high and low of the ship. It wasn't quite as wide as the engine room had been, with only around four doors leading in the typical North, South, West and East directions (with us coming from the southern end), but it still looked more than impressive with the massive cylinder of sea green fluid fuelling the rest of the ship.

"That platform over here holds the main controls for the engine" Mayu wasn't far behind me of course, her pointing out the particular bunch of old fashioned computers and consoles by flying overhead them. "It won't be the fastest way of causing this engine to explode, but it's less likely to result in a "friendly fire" situation, if you get my drift"

"I'll land there and get the right systems going" Paul immediately offered to be the 'someone' stopping there to fiddle with the machinery, and I could feel the rebuttal bubble it's way up from the inside of my stomach the moment he had even opened his mouth. Even if the rest of us couldn't hear how much pain he was in at that point in time (we most certainly could), but there were a number of other problems with that plan of his... But at the very least, it seemed that I didn't have to be the one to chew him out on that.

"Paul, you could barely get into your Vulture on your own. What makes you think you can limp your one legged person there and back without taking far too long?" Connor countered Paul's offer, speaking even further when we could hear Paul take a breath in; likely to argue his point further on it. "Let Malaki do it; he has knowledge from his husband about ships as well"

"Malaki, go and find something to make the engines go up in flames. Preferably something with a short time limit, so that we can have some extra leeway to get out of here" Using Bobby's logic as a stepping stone, I started to order the others on what to do. I was leaving no room for interpretation; Paul was to _absolutely not_ be the person climbing out of their ship. Malaki took to his task easily, his recognisable fighter soon delicately flying over the particular platform and setting itself down for a short stint of time. "Mayu and Marvin, keep an eye on anyone who may be coming through the western doors. Jfred, you're on the eastern doors alongside Paul. Connor and Bobby, you'll be monitoring the north door while I stick with the southern door"

I was yet again surprised by the lack of numbers on our side. In the past drills we had run, we typically had enough in our pack to have at least three people watching a door in such a scenario even if one person was tending to some other important task... But with seven people missing, we were stretched thinner than we would have liked in a situation such as that one.

"I've found a flaw in their system!" Malaki's words did sound a bit far away, as he had to shout into his ship for the rest of us to be able to even hear what he had found. Honestly, he could have found that someone spilled absinthe into the mixture or something as equally as banal as that, and I still would have jumped at the mere fact that something was going our way in that battlecruiser. "Apparently this mixture of fluid is incredibly volatile when contained in an airtight container!"

"...Wait, that sounds familiar"

Bobby was telling the truth; it was incredibly familiar to he, myself and Marvin. It rang a bell, no matter how old said bell was, as I could remember faintly hearing a similar thing coming out of his baritone voice in the past. Right back when I had first been interviewed by Matthias (and subsequently left behind in the care of Bobby and his two rowdy Omega cousins), we had been handling a similar kind of fluid to make particular ships work faster despite the original function of the fuel simply being to fuel most larger ships. Bobby had even threatened to not pay for the two brother's medical expenses if they had caused the containers containing said stuff to explode directly in their faces... In more ways than one, it truly was a blast from the past.

"Because this particular engine is hooked up to each remaining gun on this ship, if I send through a message to the troops manning those guns to all fire at once, the resulting shockwaves running through their systems will cause this fuel to explode!" Completely oblivious to the trip down memory lane that Bobby, Marvin and I were experiencing, Malaki kept dogmatically explaining what he was doing as he typed away on the console he was standing behind. From my position near the south door I could just barely see that he was searching for some kind of executive code, one where he would be able to fool the troops manning the guns if he sent that signal through their battlecruiser with his specific instructions. "I just need a little bit more time!"

It seemed as if we had already been testing the Alpha's patience enough that 'a little more' time was stretching it. Finally in contrast to the majority of the Alpha that had been scrabbling away from us in our collective crashing through their ship, it seemed that we had finally attracted the attention of some that were not as meek as their comrades; the eastern door opening wide to show around four of them decked out in impressive looking riot gear and heavy weaponry.

"I've got them!" Paul was naturally one of the first to spot them alongside myself, as he was watching that door like a hawk. Usually letting him mow them down by crashing into them with his Vulture would have worked any other time, this time I had the distinct feeling that it wasn't going to work out quite the way he intended it to go.

As he made a wide sweep around to build up as much speed as he could, he soon charged at them low to the platform they stood on to eliminate them. I could spot a different change in stance from two of the riot gear Alpha, likely being able to easily anticipate that he was going to be trying to ram into them from his wide movements, so they stood their ground with their superior arm muscles ready... And brought his ship to a shuddering halt by clamping their meaty hands around the nose of his ship.

Not only did Paul get thrown into the back of his seat (as evidenced by the loud grunt of pain that got communicated over his ship speakers), but it seemed that his attempts to wriggle free from their grips were about as useful as trying to pull your finger out of a Chinese Fingertrap. With those two in riot gear soon looking like they were going to be backed up by their buddies right behind them, I admittedly panicked from my position near the southern door.

"Jfred, the Viking!!" I called out for the other Alpha keeping a tight watch on the eastern door with Paul, as I knew that launching my volley of missiles could likely damage the Beta's ship beyond repair. Despite my frazzled and not completely clear set of instructions, it seemed to be that Jfred understood that I was granting him permission to switch over to the more intimidating ground setting of his ship.

With a loud roar that sounded like it probably would have penetrated through his glass dome and frightened the Alpha advancing on Paul, Jfred made his Viking take a sharp descent over to them before slamming his fist onto the button to change the settings of his ship. While I had only been in the transformation process once myself, I could easily identify the ship struggling to shift his legs from the seated position they naturally were resting in to a standing position, likely pulling and bruising Jfred's lower body in several ways as it shifted into a bipedal weapons platform.

Because the Viking was no longer concentrating fuel on keeping him afloat Jfred came slamming down out of the air, inadvertently (maybe purposefully? I'm not quite sure) causing one of his newly formed metal legs to crush the rightmost Alpha underneath his new hulking weight. Once Jfred had gotten over the initial pain of landing on his legs from a significant height, the Viking started to awkwardly creak and groan as our fellow pack member tried to steer it to face his miniguns towards his enemies.

"No, don't use your legs!" Malaki seemingly had just found the right code that he had needed for his task once we were out of the battlecruiser, hurrying back into his own ship for more reasons than just so that we could get going. He seemed to know just that bit more about the Viking, enough so that he realised that Jfred was going to make a typical mistake that most rookies would do when piloting that craft. "If you use your Alpha muscles, you'll break the machinery! You need to let the machine do most of the movement by guiding it!"

While the irritated groan coming from Jfred was quite audible, he took Malaki's advice on board; soon after moving in a much smoother motion. With the riot gear Alpha letting go of Paul's Vulture to reach for their own weapons in response, all of their guns seemed to bounce off the superior metal plating of the Viking. In contrast to their peashooters, all Jfred had to now do was activate his miniguns, the concentrated maelstrom of bullets decimating the final three riot gear Alpha remaining there.

"Mila, I... God, I can't..." Paul's communication was sketchy at best, but it wasn't from interference. He legitimately sounded like he was having difficulty with just remaining conscious by that point, likely the sudden jolt to his ship flaring up his injury. It had elevated from being barely tolerable to simply impossible for him to deal with, and he was begging me for some way that he could duck out of the fight early. Without words, I quickly opened up the rear of my Banshee while we had a moment to spare, and he was able to tell that was me telling him to get aboard. "...Thank you"

His Vulture shakily steered into the back of my ship, docking into a specific spot we had marked out for him in the back of my craft. With security locks clicking into place around his ship once my Banshee detected him landing it there, he was about as secure as could be in that point in time.

"Paul is out of action, but we can't stop here" I passed on the news to the others, firmly grabbing their attention before they could dwell on us losing our best pilot. "Jfred, I sure hope you're up for another round of flying, because now I need you back to the flight aspect of your Viking"

"Already on it" Jfred grunted slightly as his craft struggled to change back to what it was supposed to be before, especially because his first instinct was to move his muscles in the opposite direction of the movement. It was only when he finally relaxed that his ship went back to the way it was supposed to be, and he soon made it follow behind me as I circled around the large tube of fuel. "Let's blow this joint!"

"Quebec formation!" I commanded another specific formation that he and I knew well, already tilting my craft upwards so that I was aiming directly for the patch of roof that was weakened by Sera's wreckage. With Jfred soon soaring right up towards the roof along with me, his ship was pressed right against what could be considered the belly of mine, the both of us twisting in mid-air as we neared our target. "Fire black star missile and disintegration bomb!"

"Firing!" I waited a split second for his missile to go first, as his needed to do damage before mine could really do that little bit extra. As expected, his missile broke into what seemed to be a million pieces, piercing the roof in several places to the point where it had enough holes to be considered a perforated surface. Not only did this make sure that our room was going to be equalised much faster with the gravity outside of the ship, but it made the surface far more brittle in contrast to whatever it had been before.

Using the upward momentum of my ship to my advantage, I launched my disintegration bomb moments after Jfred's missile, watching the light blue bomb launch directly ahead of our collective ships. With a flash of bright blue light, it caused an entire bubble of carnage directly above our ships, finally clearing the way out of the battlecruiser and back towards the familiar look of stars and far off planets.

"Everybody out of the battlecruiser!" I didn't feel like I had to necessarily tell them to do so, but there was always a part of me that wanted to be safe rather than sorry. With Marvin's Valkyrie soon appearing by Jfred and my side as we tilted our ships the right way up again, I was more than happy to see each and every one of the fighters soon coming out right behind us back to the battlefield. "Malaki, warn the fighters first about the explosion, and then don't hold back"

"Already done" Malaki proudly conveyed that he wasn't exactly sitting around while Jfred, Marvin and I were stealing the show, his ship coming to rest beside ours along with the other fighters. With the seven ships soaring back out as a pack yet again, I anxiously couldn't wait to see this second battlecruiser go up in flames just like their comrades had done in the first one we had taken care of.

"...Did I miss it?"

I turned my head at the sound of someone asking me that, and it was only a second later that the heavy flares of pain told me that Paul had slipped out of his unconscious state just as quickly as he had gone into it. While he certainly wasn't having an easy time of it, he managed to hobble and limp his way from the cockpit of his Vulture to come sit in the spare seat right next to mine.

"No, you didn't" I proudly told him that, tilting one of the monitors in my cockpit to show him that the battlecruiser was still standing... For now. He elicited a noise that sounded like a mixture of a pained whine and a single note of laughter, equally proud of me as much as he was trying to ignore the searing pain in his leg.

 **"All gunnery crew, fire on my mark in six seconds"** Malaki was perfectly pretending to be nothing more than one of their commanding officers, as our communication vector was strong enough to interfere with the enemies information based on the specific frequency Malaki had nabbed from their controls. Even more so, he was using a voice modifier, so none of the enemies could have even claimed that he 'didn't sound like someone they knew'. **"Executive code; Bravo, India, Tango, Charlie, Hotel"**

"...Their executive code was bitch?" Connor couldn't help but make a dig at our enemies one last time, especially so since the Alpha on board the enemy battlecruiser could not hear him. With a chorus of laughter coming from our pack at that jab (with some minor cringing from some of us from the harsh language as always), our pack of seven ships turned around ever so slightly to get a better view.

Despite a momentary from my mind about whether the Alpha would even be able to all count in unison with each other on that ship, after six seconds passed by each gun seemed to fire at the same time as one another, the sound of their weaponry punching through the cold vacuum of space... But the far greater noise came from the catastrophic sound of glass and metal shattering, with massive shockwaves of angry acidic fuel flooding through their entire ship before spilling out like an angry hissing volcano.

When I changed my frequency for a moment to the entire movement of the P.W.C., I was completely swamped by the sound of cheering; coming from engineers aboard the Helicarrier, those that recently learned how to fly the fighters in their green hands, and the seasoned pilots who had waited most of their lives for this moment. I only needed to listen for a second before knowing that I did well, looking at Paul proudly before flicking it back to the more private version that only held my direct pack.

...But naturally, just because we were cheering and winning the fight so far, did not mean that we had won everything. In fact, I think there would have been quite a high chance that the enemies on that sneaky third battlecruiser were yelling vitriol and wanting bloodlust in exchange for what we had done. They proved that more than anything when their third battlecruiser dared to approach from the back of the battlefield, aiming a large high tech swath of light at our Helicarrier.

"Sweet Mother of God!" I could hear Matthias call out in a startled manner, sounding more fearful for his life than he had ever sounded in that fight. My hands naturally shot out to flick the communication vector over so that I could ask him what was happening, but Matthias was no fool; he already knew what was going wrong long before I had to prompt him. "They're attempting to teleport us off our ship into the vacuum of space!!"

"Wai-What?!" Marvin worriedly called out, not understanding how on Alfu they could have gotten such impressive technology and hidden it for this long. The Alpha certainly didn't have a single ship to focus all of their technology and weaponry on, so instead they seemingly had built each and every one of their battlecruisers like glass cannons; with devastating power in one specific field of expertise. The bloated battlecruiser had been filled to the brim with helicopters and other (gravity bound) flying equipment, the second battlecruiser had impressively astounding mounted guns and turrets, and this final hidden one had every single technological advantage that they could cram aboard it. "Everyone?!"

"I'm not sure about _everyone_ , but it definitely has a hold on everyone here in the hangar! We'll be pulled out in about a minute if nothing is done!" Trent could back up Matthias' claim, meaning that our enemies weren't just aiming for those who were on the bridge. Even Blaire sounded like she wanted to break protocol to just give her possible final words to her husband

My hands shot to my controls, hurriedly pushing my Banshee back into the fight, thinking at a million miles an hour to figure out a solution to this problem. As much as it seemed impossible in that moment, there always was some way to turn the tides. If these battlecruisers were glass cannons, then that not only meant that they were really strong in one department; it also meant that their defense was pitifully weak.

"Matthias, how long do you need until that electric pulse of our own can be shot at them again?" I asked him, but the answer was not what I had been hoping for.

"More than an hour, at least!" Matthias worriedly told me that, as he no doubt could see the writing on the wall. Unless we could come up with something soon, we were going to have at least twenty-five million dead engineers.

"What about our fighters still on the field?!" Bobby asked, clearly also panicked about the idea of something that catastrophic even happening. He and the others were following behind me as I headed towards that battlecruiser, but it was clear in their uncertain flight patterns that they didn't have a particular plan on what we were supposed to do. "Can't they bring down the enemy before they're done?!

"Considering the armoured plating and high tech shielding, I highly doubt it!" Connor sadly had to refute that possibility, as firing at them while our comrades died was not the way to go. "Oh, actually their shielding seems to be down right now. They likely are funnelling all of their power to their mass teleportation right now"

...Their shielding was down, and they had absolutely no troops to stand in our way. Those words, along with the words 'glass cannon' lingering around in my mind caused me to look up at the bridge visible on their battlecruiser, which also was made of glass. Just like our Helicarrier, the most fragile part of their ship no doubt had to be the wide glass windows allowing people to look out onto the battlefield. Knowing that it would absolutely kill me to send someone off on a literal kamikaze run, I swallowed my pride and pushed the Banshee to its limits, darting through the gaps in between our own fighters.

"...You're taking a page from Tanner's book" It didn't take Paul long to discover what I was doing, and initially I didn't answer him. I supposed that I was worried that talking to him would end up making me hesitate in my decision... And honestly, that was a likely scenario to happen. "I knew he was a bad influence on you the moment you and he met at the company eighteen years ago"

That final remark clearly had been phrased as a joke, and it served to chip away slowly at the momentary walls I had plastered around my heart. It was exactly the kind of attitude I had originally been drawn to, reminding me of exactly who I had fallen in love with. But even more than just love, his words had always stuck with me... About how I was the reason he was coming home.

"...I really wanted to make it home to marry you"

As the tears started to fill my eyes, I flicked off my communication vector so that it was just the both of us there. With one hand firmly plastered on the steering to keep us hurtling towards the battlecruiser in our sights, I lifted up one hand to reach out towards him. It didn't take him long to find that bit of energy to lift his right hand to hold mine in his own. I possibly made the mistake of glancing at him out of the corner of my eyes, and I found myself very nearly losing my confidence all in one go.

In eighteen years, it was the first ever time I had seen him scared of dying. Even worse, I could see in his teary eyes, that my own face reflected that same fear.

"...Me too" I admitted that with a shaky voice, those tears in the bottom of my eyelids finally falling down my face.

I could have imagined so many different things we could have admitted in that moment. Perhaps he would have admitted his fantasies of how I would have looked at the end of that long church. Maybe I would have told him about how I could totally imagine him crying in utter joy when he lifted my veil. He likely could predict that I would have something equally corny and teasing as my wedding vow, or how I would see the smiles on our faces from our best man giving a heartfelt speech, or how we could totally imagine that Jfred and Matthias would have argued about who was supposed to give me away... But we didn't say any of them. We were too afraid of admitting them; to realise that none of them were going to come true. All I could hope, was that the lord above saw us fit to be with each other in heaven...

 _Bang!_ A fighter came tearing past our Banshee at such a speed that they didn't even seem to pay attention to avoid banging into one of our colossal wings, sending our ship off course. I had to take my hand back from Paul for a brief second to right our ship correctly, and it was during that movement that I realised that I... Recognised the fighter that had banged into us.

It wasn't a random fighter from the millions in our movement. No, it specifically belonged to someone within my pack.

"...Ah! It's about time you turned your communicator back on. You were really worrying everyone else back there, you know?" Mayu's voice was the one that greeted me when I finally switched the vector back on, her fighter still hurtling through the air at a faster rate than what my Banshee could keep up with. "I had a feeling that you were attempting something like this, so let me do it. You and Paul still have each other to go home back to, while I... Gunner's not waiting for me. So let me do this for you, alright?"

Mayu didn't give me much choice in the matter, her ship reaching the battlecruiser long before I could have told her otherwise. And while it felt incredibly selfish to say aloud, I was... Very thankful to her.

With one final acrobatic stunt for good measure, her fighter slammer right into the bulk of the glass on that bridge. Not only did the hurtling of her ship decimate those who happened to stand in her way, but the shattered glass also allowed the change of gravity to take place, with the remaining Alpha in that bridge being dragged out into the cold embrace of space.

As expected, the bridge had been controlling most of the things going on in that ship, with the swath of light soon dissipating a moment later.

"...Oh my goodness, we're alright" Katra's voice breaking through the silence told me that Mayu's selfless sacrifice had saved millions of lives, even if she had gotten the idea from myself or Tanner respectively. The secondary gasp coming from Katra told me that she likely had glanced over at Blaire's screen right next to her, spelling out the clear and obvious truth of what had happened.

With the immediate threat of danger past us, those feelings of panic and confusion slowly dissipated from my mind. Hovering there in front of the final battlecruiser out of the three that had been plaguing us for god only knew how long... With it serving as another reminder for all of the lives we had lost, the amount of good people in my pack that could have lived long and happy lives had those Alpha stayed in their privileged little bubbles... I was **furious.**

Moving my hand over to my communication vector and the other back to my controls of the ship, I flicked the vector so that everybody who dared to listen could hear me loud and clear. With a sense of bloodlust that could only come from those who had been trodden on and mistreated for so long, I shouted with all of my might.

 **"KILL THEM!!!"** I screamed with such force that I felt like I would have made myself hoarse if I even dared to repeat it one more time, my hands immediately thereafter reaching for my controls and firing every single missile volley I had left in my arsenal.

Right after my first volley came the shots coming from Jfred's minigun and Marvin's Valkyrie, and only a short second later did Bobby, Connor and Malaki join me in firing their lasers at the final battlecruiser. Even Paul lifted his hands to the assistant gun controls on the Banshee, joining in despite his meagre contributions.

The fighters came along in a massive tidal wave of precision lasers and plasma shots, firing wantonly in such a manner that conveyed that they didn't care if they hit something important; they just wanted to see the damn thing **burn.** I only felt better when the loud punches of our Helicarrier guns joined in; it never felt like enough despite us having more firepower than I had ever seen in my entire life.

We didn't dare stop when the main engines seemed to combust at the back of the ship, nor when the main living quarters seemed to get shredded, nor when the engine rooms seemed to explode under our constant abuse. We had waited so long to get revenge for everything that by this point they could have been begging us for their lives and we would have torn everything they loved to the ground. Even when my own ship seemed to run out of ammo in terms of missiles, I still switched over to the pitiful guns just so that I felt like I was still ending them where they stood. A feral scream escaped my throat, finally making my voice as hoarse as I felt it should have been after my first outburst, finally getting that retribution for all of this time. Eighteen years... Eighteen **_damn_** years, I had spent having to come here to fix their stupid attitude! It! Was! Finally! **OVER**!!!

...It was only when the last speck of still held together battlecruiser crumbled, that I finally let go of my white knuckled grip on my guns. It was only then, they we finally dared to let out cheers that we had gotten everything we had ever wished for in that fight. Every single family member, lover, friend or even platonic soulmate that had died or been tortured by those Alpha's hands... They finally could rest easy knowing that nobody would ever go through what they had.

"We did it" Paul almost sounded like he couldn't believe it, sitting beside me. After a long while of me just sitting in the back of my seat, absolutely tired after eighteen years of preparing myself for that moment, I held my hand out again. He gladly held in his; this time, with hope for the future in his eyes... And I was glad to have the opportunity to be there with him. "We did it!"

With the hoarsest voice in my life, I smiled softly at him; as I couldn't agree more.

"...Together"


	10. On Pandora; Heavy-Handed

I had a direct view to the sky and space above our planet when those battlecruisers finally arrived, the typical clouds and dust storms somehow being able to tell that I needed them gone in that moment of time. The two battlecruisers continuing on their journey despite our allies firing upon them from behind made it all that much more real, even more than the loud chattering of anxious troops and people running everywhere for their tasks.

Our stand against the Alpha took place just a bit between my created town of Hope and the still somehow sprawling city Opportunity, taking great use of the barren rocky, desert that seemed to stretch on for as far as the eye could see. The most popular landing spot for large ships were either in the large wealthy city or the ravine nearby it, and I knew from the shared blood flowing in my veins that they couldn't resist the chance to fight my massive army of troops waiting for them in the flat plains.

Even in the middle of the approximately forty billion troops that stood at the ready, there was a bustle that had never been reached before. After all, if we were careless in our fight then it would be a cakewalk for the Alpha to win; if a single billion Alpha managed to land, then each one of their beefy warriors only had to beat down forty approximate people before our force was entirely gone. To prevent that possibility from ever happening, there was a tidal wave of people still moving about to get things done, like the surf of the ocean filtering through the cracks of a pebble beach.

"Ally, those battlecruisers will be breaching the planet's atmosphere in twenty minutes" Chris, one of my nearby communication specialists (and dearly beloved pack members) reported on what our flight squadron had estimated. I hummed a quick affirmative 'mh-hm', both to show that I had heard him perfectly fine and that I had predicted something along those lines myself from eyeballing it. There was a small part of my mind that was disappointed that I couldn't deal with the larger set of the two forces, but I shrugged those thoughts off when I remembered that we had a handicap in comparison to Mila simply because for her the troops wouldn't even get to disembark off their battlecruisers to face her force. "Would you like me to send through a checklist to our different groups?"

"Those checklists are secondary to making sure that our allies are going to keep their word" I tapped my foot impatiently as I readjusted my Shephard's Cowl, as I was _not_ a fan of the fact that Timothy hadn't reported in to us yet. Furthermore, we still had one or two lingering teams that were not gathered at the main battlefield that I had set up. "Have we heard anything from team K or team Cy?"

"Team Cy's leader have just reported that they are returning back with team K's trucks" Another communicator - her name being Mathilda - spoke just underneath my feet, as I had made the decision as the main leader of the rebellion to stand tall on a large rock outcropping near the centre of the troops to give extra motivation. My communicators were naturally much better hidden than I was on that rock outcropping, as they were the ones manning our radios and giving the orders to the entire horde of troops and special teams after I barked them out. "Apparently the council for Opportunity are still not willing to join the fight"

I clicked my tongue in annoyance at that new information, but I had considered that possibility from the very first moment that council had refused our offer a number of years back. It seemed that even staring down the barrel of the gun wasn't enough to get them to budge, those ignorant rich politicians truly believing that the Alpha wouldn't harm them if they remained 'neutral'. In the end, I wasn't going to sacrifice a single person to save their stupid hides if they weren't going to be returning the favour for my forty billion people... So, I hoped they liked being shot/torn apart/some other horrific death by a bunch of Alpha then.

"Dan will be returning to his team right after PJ drops him back off" Chris still had the ingrained habit of referring to members of his pack by their names rather than the official titles but I wasn't in the mood to correct him on it, especially when there was a part of me that still enjoyed how informal he remained with me. Dan was in charge of leading team Cy (short for cyborg, as everyone in his team had improvements made in some manner due to robotic enhancements), while PJ led the K team (named so because of Potassium, which was a big staple in our explosives). "Spek has the leader of Helios on the line for you, by the way"

Spek - who called herself that for her rampant obsession with eating bacon - handed me the receiver for her radio with a toothy grin, while still carefully hiding in the little nooks and crannies of my rock outcropping. She likely was grinning so much because of the huge difference between the real Handsome Jack and the pretend one who had taken his place (accidentally, mind you) after the former had left Helios with me twenty years prior.

"Err.... Um, hello? Handsome Jack speaking" Timothy Lawrence - my mentor figure's old body-double - spoke nervously once he could hear me picking up the receiver. If it hadn't been for his complete surgery and voice change to match what my old boss used to look and sound like, I could swear that I would have heard his typical verbal tick of his voice breaking when he was nervous.

"It still shocks me to this day that people honestly think you're _the_ Handsome Jack" I couldn't find it in me to hide my contempt, despite the fact that Helios had been doing much more to help people after my old boss had left (Timothy was much more philanthropic after all). Perhaps it simply came down my prideful Alpha blood - and the natural bias that I had for the man who had come before him - that made me look down on him for his cowardly nature. He wasn't a leader, he wanted to avoid conflict no matter what and I had the strong suspicion that he would have turned tail and ran if people hadn't mistaken him to be the infamous leader that Jack had been.

"...Yeah, I guess" Even his response to my jab seemed to be as non-committal as it could get, which made my fingers tap impatiently on my receiver to communicate without words that he was wasting my time. "So, uh... You just need my station to help out by firing the Moonshot against your opposing ships?"

"Along with some extra loader bots to cause extra damage on the inside, like little maggots festering into a wound" I tweaked the plan ever so slightly, as naturally it would be the best thing to take down both battlecruisers before one of their troops even could land on our precious sandy earth. It seemed that my analogy was too gruesome for him to imagine even with the idea of metal on metal, as I could hear him gag over the receiver. Something in the way he gagged made me remember just how pacifistic he could sometimes be, so I felt it extra necessary to remind him that I would not tolerate being betrayed or abandoned in this fight. "And Tim? If I find out that you don't stick to your part of the deal, then you should know that I have a special task force prepared - even if we lose - that will come right up to Helios... **And they'll be coming to tear you limb from limb** "

"..." Timothy was silent for a moment at my threat, clearly just a bit surprised that I would even dare say that to him despite getting along reasonably well with one another when we both worked at the same company. Eventually he seemed to find his words, but they were about as harsh as being slapped with wet tissue paper. "...Has anyone told you that you remind me of Handsome Jack?"

"You say that as though it is an insult" I mockingly laughed at his attempt to make me regret my threat, as I knew full well that even at my worst, I was never at the level of 'nuking an entire planet' levels of bad. And once you took that part into account, then it simply left me with the knowledge that I had his terrifying ruthlessness... Which was far closer to a compliment in every manner possible to me. With that exchange handled, I cut him off from any further protest, before handing back the receiver to Spek and getting right back to other tasks piled onto me. "Make a roll call for our special teams, as well as for our shield warriors and attacking force"

An affirmative response came from all three communicators hiding away around me, dialling into the specific teams that they had the frequencies of. With us having three of them at once, it made controlling our forces an absolute breeze compared to me trying to control everyone at once. In the worst possible scenario, I would be able to issue orders to three different groups that were having difficulties, and even possibly leave my post to join the fight in the direst of circumstances.

"Team K is in position at the rear of our forces to the East, and team Cy is prepared at the entrance to the side ravine to the North-North-West" Mathilda explained for those two, as PJ likely had returned to the rear with his trucks full of explosives, and Dan had been dropped back off to his team of cyborgs near the entrance of the North most ravine. We anticipated that there would be a bunch of Alpha who tried to slip around our main forces, but they would easily be dealt with in there with the reinforced troops. "Team DL2 is reporting in from their position inside the opening of the completed Vault cave to our current North-North-East, and Team Hunt is lingering near the sleeping Rakk Hive North of Opportunity"

DL2 simply referred to the term of "daddy long legs", which was shortened down for Danny's team. It didn't matter what class you were to him, if you were swift, got around well with agility or were quick in any manner then there was a good chance that he would take you on in his team. While the original nickname assigned to his group (daddy) was funny in itself, it was still too long (and too distracting, if your name happened to be Jack Harland) to be a proper term for his team.

As for team Hunt, they unfortunately got... What could only be referred to as the 'short stick' of tasks. Whether it would be woken up by the vibrations and loud roaring of a battlecruiser storming in through the atmosphere or by some other method, they were supposed to be the ones leading the incredibly temperamental creatures to the enemy, no matter the cost. I had assured Jesse from the bottom of my heart that she didn't have to lead such a dangerous task, but she insisted. Likely because of her own pride, one that would let her do such a task even if meant her life. She truly believed in fighting for the future, and I could only be proud of her for that dedication.

"Team Spar and team Hyena are prepared in their interspersed locations throughout the army, while we're waiting just a bit longer for K2 to prepare their bombs" Spek went next, explaining that Mark's team (full name being Spartacus) and Jack's team were ready (Hyena), with the former being the ones to run the shielding at the front of our army and the latter having small clumps of Alpha all throughout the army to give the Alpha some pause for thought if they advanced too far. K2 was Kyanna's team, having a stealthier and more precise approach to her bombs unlike PJ's bomb squad on wheels. "Hydra is still waiting on our call"

It was going to be one of the inevitable downsides to not seeing your enemies face; as I was going to sincerely be bummed out that I couldn't see the utter terror on their faces when Hydra revealed themselves and their weapon. Ah well, I could at the very least imagine their wails of fright when it was fired upon them.

"Sean is ready with his team of Snip, and Joy has full control of Arc right behind us" Chris went last, blending both the names and teams together in a way that I could understand it. Snip wasn't literally referring to a scissor, instead being short for 'sniper', his team being a long way away from the battlefield to snipe particularly dangerous looking opponents for us. Arc too was not a literal name, as it more referred to the arc that an arrow would take when fired upon the enemy; meaning that she was in charge of any kind of weapon that didn't shoot entirely straight... Which equalled a lot, considering our massive size. "Lissa is on standby with Flight should we need her, and Jade's team of Ban is dispersed through the army just like Hyena to provide first aid. Phil's team of Hermes is waiting, in case we need him."

Lissa's was pretty self-explanatory, as she flew overhead us in a large squadron of ships that had been abandoned (and subsequently fixed by us) by the rich people of Opportunity. Ban was short 'bandage', with Jade flitting in between injured troops to bring them medicine and a momentary friendly smile like she could always pull off so well. And finally, Hermes was the Greek messenger god, meaning that Phil's troop was our second hand messengers on the battlefield should the main ways of communication fail for any reason.

"Reporting; the Battlecruisers have entered the stratosphere" Lissa's voice ended up droning through Chris' radio, and his head tilted ever so slightly to see whether I had heard the announcement. I had, gesturing over to Spek to hand me their receiver so that I could call upon Hydra when I needed to.

When our army registered the two battlecruisers coming closer towards us, most of the chatter and energy seemed to die out, instead being replaced by a quiet malice in preparation for what we were going to be facing. My fingers danced over so slightly in a drumming motion over the receiver in my hands once again, waiting for the moment when Hydra would be able to fire upon them. Just as I began to worry about Timothy not helping us, the true first shot of our war started to commence.

Albeit it appeared slow to us on the surface of Pandora, the space station hovering above Elpis turned at an astonishing rate once our enemies crossed the point of no return in our stratosphere, before taking its first shot at what seemed to be our leftmost Battlecruiser. A barrage of metal containers shot out of the Eye of Helios with a massive shuddering blast, raining down a hailstorm of carnage upon that ship. It was akin to the world’s largest shotgun in existence, clearly loaded up with as many containers as it could manage to cause the _most_ damage in the shortest amount of time, tearing into the rearmost part of the ship where the engines lay.

That battlecruiser seemed incapable of recovering from that shot, it's lights flickering out at the same time that it seemed to stop advancing, floating uselessly far from the planet's surface. While I could have fired upon that one with again with our own weaponry (truly kicking someone while they were down, in multiple levels), I knew full well that crippling both ships would be far better for us than decimating one. The only benefit of destroying the first ship would be to terrify those that were housed in the second, and well... They seemed far too hard-headed to really relent for something that minor.

"Hydra, you have clearance to rise" I spoke confidently into the receiver, feeling a moment later how the ground and sand shook underneath me a split second later. Huh, he must have been patiently waiting for the exact moment that he was allowed to join us.

The ocean bordering on our town of Hope began to judder and shake, as though we had set off an earthquake directly under the water's surface. With vast waves crashing into the cliffs and enough white water churning around like a barrage of whirlpools, slowly a massive figure started to appear underneath the surface of that ocean, before bursting through the surface of the water. The gleaming silver appearance of our massive planetary cannon (one that rivalled the size of the Helios space station itself) spelled out that our planet was not nearly as easy as they thought it was going to be, and the man sitting in the controls was going to remind them of that quite efficiently.

"Which?" Ninja Brian - the aforementioned man stationed on the gunner's seat for the planetary cannon - didn't use many words, and I knew that quite well from the years that I had spent with him in my pack. Even so, I could hear the childlike excitement in his single word, undoubtedly eager to use the massive machine that he, Jack and myself had been building for fourteen years.

"The one still advancing" I instructed him that the stalled one could wait for a moment, before softly covering my ears and opening my mouth to deal with the shock-wave. Like a tidal-wave, my movement ended up cluing in my three communication people, who told the leaders of each team quickly; and before long our army was copying me to prevent damage to our eardrums.

Out of the corner of my eye I could spy the end of the planetary cannon slowly glow a bright white colour, before it shot out the heavy beam with a massive _WHUM!_ to accompany the flash of brilliant light. That beam soared through the air brilliantly as the rest of us felt the tell-tale shake of the shock-wave rattle our planet (and us, although we were far smaller than Pandora itself), but the cost of us having to protect our eardrums was well worth what we inevitably got; the beam tearing a massive hole in the back of the battlecruiser still barrelling its way towards us.

"Reporting; the battlecruiser that has been damaged by the Moonshot is deploying escape pods" Lissa continued to report on things once she was certain that I would be listening, and it was true; I could spy little grey pods being launched from the battlecruiser in the rear. The one closer to us didn't seem to be advancing anymore, but it had gotten close enough to the surface that it didn't linger like its comrade did; instead seeming like it was slowly going to crash into its original destination.

"Estimate a general location for both the still advancing battlecruiser and the escape pods" I informed Lissa of this, and there was the momentary period of silence where she began to calculate what I asked her to. In the meantime, I had even more to figure out in terms of Hydra, and whether it was going to be something that we could use more than once in a row. "Ninja Brian, how are things looking with the planetary cannon?"

"It's pretty hot" If it wasn't for the fact I knew that Ninja Brian was both asexual and aromantic in nature, I would have almost interpreted that remark as a joke. But because he was, it likely meant that his short sentence was referring in the literal sense that the gun was likely to overheat in the harsh weather of the Pandoran desert if he fired it too many times... Which did make sense, as it had originally been made with machinery that had been acquired from derelict space stations, which usually operated at the cool temperature of space instead. "We're going to submerge again; to keep us safe and cool it down faster"

"Keep me posted" I gave him permission to submerge the gun and his crew yet again (they still had working Oz kits on them, so I wasn't worried about their non-existent breathing underwater), feeling the ocean shake and churn yet again as it began to lower the massive platform that it rested on.

"The battlecruiser is going to be crashing in the ravine between Opportunity and our army's current position, to your West. Impact shock-wave is minimal, it should be about the same as the one you just experienced from the planetary cannon" Lissa filled in where the big hulking mass of metal was going, it landing where I had initially estimated where they were going to be. "The escape pods seem to be congregating to the far North of your current position. Be wary of a potential pincer manoeuvre"

As if I didn't have a big enough list to warrant to smashing those fools’ faces into the dirt, they now were trying to pull off a move that I had gotten stung by a long time ago. Unfortunately for them, that simple fact meant that I was heightened to the possibility of a pincer attack, and I was more likely to literally leap off my post and smash their skulls open than deal with it again.

"Estimated troops?" I asked her, the receiver in my hands immediately chirping back her response the moment I wasn't keeping the button pressed down on it.

"If each escape pod is filled with nothing but troops, then around one hundred and fifty thousand troops" Lissa reported, her and her troops carefully keeping an eye on each little grey dot that escaped from that battlecruiser. While the Alpha on that ship seemed like they weren't going to be joining the fight with their brethren, I still was keeping a wary eye on it.

"Make a number of runs over the escape pods before and after they land; shoot down as many as you can before they even so much as breath a single breath of our dusty air" There was no way that I was going to tolerate those people sneaking their way around my main batch of troops, and I felt more than ready for them when Lissa acknowledged the order; her ships flying sharply over my head to the North of my position. But it wasn't like single orders to one part of my army was enough; I essentially had to be a puppet master and have my fingers on every single string, pulling the right strings at the right time. "DL2, keep an eye on the troops to our North. Provide support to them if they need it, and stop any Alpha who may come in our direction"

"Our eyes are peeled Ally" Danny proudly responded to my leadership, a complete flip from the days when I had first met him - where getting him to follow orders would have been about as difficult as finding a Bullymong with natural bright green fur (they don't exist).

Right as I could feel the massive earthquake like shake from the battlecruiser slamming into the ravine in front of our main army, I knew it was time. With the help of our planetary cannon and the Eye of Helios, we had evened the odds even more in our favour - because let's face it, we were already phenomenally lucky with having Mila and her movement on our side. And even though it still was quite the thing to face, I was going to relish every single dead bastard who dared to show their face.

"Tune me in to every special team, and raise the volume enough so that it will carry to the most troops" I instructed Mathilda, who happily smiled and seemed to adjust her radio just for that. Yammering on with a long speech would just make my troops completely bonkers (as they would think that I wasn't paying attention), and it was never quite my strong suit anyway. What was my strong suit was the part of me that could honestly carry my confidence and absolute belief in my cause, and I knew that was more than good enough. "Come on fuckers, let's dance"


	11. On Pandora; The Thrill of the Hunt

"SHIELDS UP!!" Even without the radio receivers barking out their instructions, I honestly believed that I would have heard Mark and his fellow team of Spar loudly call that command to the front row of our army. Within seconds a ten meter high wall of honeycomb shaped blue shields sprung up, ones that could easily allow our troops to fire through them without anything to deter them. It wasn't completely enclosing our troops like some shields would do in a dome form, but with a more concentrated version at the front it was sturdier than the dome could provide us. Besides, if the Alpha were foolish enough to try to leap over it, then I'm quite certain that there would be plenty of small clusters from Hyena that would happily tear them apart.

As they did that, I pulled a folded up spy glass from my waist and unfurled it before my eyes; peering into the distance at exactly where that infernal battlecruiser had landed. It turned out to have landed a little bit closer to our patch of desert plain than Lissa had predicted that it would do, being visible quite clearly to my probing glance. They truly had landed stupidly, with its front end slammed into the ground and teetering dangerously at an angle like some weird foreign piece of abstract art. With the catastrophic amount of damage done at the front and via the massive hole in the rear from our planetary cannon it was clear that it was no longer going to be able to take off in any manner, being crumpled down by a third of its original size.

"Announce to the troops that the amount of troops in the enemy force has been reduced from its original number of one billion" I informed my three communicators, my ears quite distinctly picking up that Spek was already doing so from the very moment the words started to come out of my mouth. "Due to the damage taking place at the front with the bridge, it's likely minimal, but it will undoubtedly be their main leaders. Approximate twenty thousand of their top brass"

"The leader of team Hyena would like to know if they are advancing already" Mathilda reported in that Jack was already getting antsy - which I could understand, as I was the kind of person who just wanted the bastards to come at us already so that we could crush them under our boots - but I did not have great news for him just yet in that regard.

"No, it would appear that they are somewhat shell shocked from the sudden crash landing" I huffed angrily, despite the fact it was a perfectly valid response for most people if they did not expect it. War did make common courtesy fly out of the window though, so I couldn't give a flying fuck if it was the 'normal' response or not.

With that lull in time, I took the opportunity presented to me to enact another plan of mine. After flashing a signal to Chris and Phil (the latter of which was stationed right beneath my rock outcropping; mainly to send messages right from our location but equally because I needed him there to enact his side of the plan), I placed my spyglass right at my feet and waited for the other two to act first.

Taking one of Jack's many inventions (the 'wind grenade'; albeit he believed that this one was useless for battle), Phil slammed it into the sandy ground beneath him; allowing the device to activate into a massive blast of air that kicked up a whole heap of sand. For those of us on the rock outcropping it simply seemed to be a freak bit of sandstorm - as those were quite common on Pandora - but I was able to use the sudden cloud of sand to my advantage. Pulling off a tactic that I hadn't used in a long time, I watched as Chris slipped on a similar cloak to the one I was wearing at the same time as clipping on a Hologuise and a voice modulator to become a perfect copy in replacement for me; his typically black hair instead showing as long blond hair, and my face being reflected back at me when I even so much as glanced in his direction. With him taking my place as I calmly stepped off the front of the outcropping, I dropped down to the ground as I applied my old mask onto my face, donning my old title of Shadow one final time.

 _"This one really takes me back_ " I could hear Phil think as I fully kitted myself out, as of course the moment reminded me of an old trick I had told them about long ago. As long as you gave the impression that the leader was someone else, then the real leader could be pulling tactics in the background with no trouble. And considering that the only people who knew about my swap were my direct pack members, even the direct troops at the front lines couldn't inadvertently give it away.

 _"Make sure to stay close to Chris, he might end up needing you"_ While I did appreciate his upbeat attitude, I needed him to measure that out in equal amounts to concentrating on this fight; it wasn't something we could repeat if it went wrong. With a sharp nod, he was right back to his role, and I was open to any kind of role that I needed to pull off. _"Chris, make me proud"_

 _"You bet"_ I could just hear the pride brimming in his emotions when he responded to that, preparing to be another layer for my communication. Once the fighting truly started we would undoubtedly be flooded with a million reports from our army, and we couldn't respond to them all. Chris was not only there to still act as me (to be the moral figure that our soldiers would need in the fight), but I would rely on him to decide which reports were important for me to hear, cutting down the chatter and letting me make the more important decisions. " _You're still wearing the Shephard's Cowl?"_

 _"I never would dream of going without it"_ In a small bit of nervousness, I readjusted my cowl just that little bit more over my head; the part of my body that would be just as vulnerable as any other class type.

We had argued many a time over whether he was supposed to wear it on his elevated position or whether I needed it as the true leader (it had been a pain the ass to get, considering how effective it was in protecting anyone who wore it), but I had lost every single time in that battle of wits. I was headstrong at the worst of moments, but he was right; losing me in the thick of battle would cause a bigger problem than anyone else.

"Ally, team Hunt is on the move" It seemed that Mathilda really hadn't noticed my swap (nor the fact that she wouldn't have spotted Chris if she leaned a little bit further to her right), as she proceeded to speak to Chris without so much as an eye-blink. Perhaps if she had been an Alpha, then perhaps she would have smelled the distinct difference in his weaker Beta scent, but it wasn't all that important in the long run. "The crash of the battlecruiser has awakened the Rakk Hive, and they don't think they'll be able to delay it"

"Try to monitor the situation as it progresses" Chris answered ambiguously, tilting his eyes downward ever so slightly as his voice modulator perfectly replicated my own voice. I let him know via a thought in my mind that I had heard that new announcement, and that I was going to handle that in the best way I knew possible; in person.

Another device that Jack had been working on for a long time, was a smaller device that had been placed beneath my cloak above my heart. It was a odd thing, shaped like an old alarm clock that people no longer used. However, this one had special diodes placed in the display that would flash purple when special buttons were pressed on similar devices, and was specially designed to resonate with the signal that came from the others. Effectively, Jack has made a device that would tell me when the others (my pack members) needed help, allowing me to teleport to them if I so decided.

And like I expected, Jesse's specific diode was flashing purple underneath my jacket. With no other people needing my help at that time, I decided that I could spare the time in helping her coral the massive beasts to our enemies; flicking the switch on my teleporter and letting it take me with a flash of brilliant purple light.

It didn't take me long to reappear in a completely different location, far from the vast hordes of my army. Far off in the distance to the South was Opportunity and I likely only had to glance towards the East to spy the abstract art that was the crashed battlecruiser... I didn't have long to admire the view however; the thundering feeling of something massive stomping their way towards me spelled that truth out. By the time I could feel my feet touch onto the sand underneath it, I already started to run in the opposite direction of where the ground shaking footsteps were coming from, and before long I could notice the fact that there were five other people joining in on that stampede right behind me.

" _Ally, you absolute bitch, I thought you weren't going to make it!"_ After slowing down ever so slightly so that I was no longer outpacing team Hunt, I was pleasantly surprised by the mischievous nature that Jesse greeted me with. She could recognise me easily from my outfit and my pack link with her, but clearly her other four underlings were a little behind in terms of uncovering who I was; their guns lifted to aim at me in case I was going to be a problem for them. I wasn't in any capacity, with Jesse giving a slight flick of her wrist that told them that I wasn't a threat to them.

" _You're quite lucky; I was actually thinking along the same lines myself"_ While callous, it was quite true; her team was the furthest away from the other teams on the plains, and it had been originally predicted that the Rakk Hive would only awaken after much worse tremors started to shake the ground. I could spare a momentary glance at the hulking four legged best charging after us, with little Rakks sprouting from its back to come shrieking down out of the sky in our direction. " _It's quite the trophy for one final hunt"_

She seemed to laugh internally in response to that, finding some kind of mirth in the concept of it being her final hunt. In that split instant I could feel her various conflicting emotions clashing with one another, with some memories even having two variants of itself within her mind. Some part of her wished that Ossa was right between her legs until the end... But she also knew full well that her old buddy had passed away peacefully seven years before that fight. Even if he had been alive by then she wouldn't have dragged his poor bones into the fray yet again, so it seemed to be that she simply wanted to have some kind of support, which I luckily was able to provide for her.

In another recess of her mind, seemed to be a specific memory replaying of Mark and her bitterly fighting with each other whether it was right for her to decide to throw away her life to secure a better chance of victory. Mark naturally saw it in the sense that their son - Turk - would be devastated with her death, and ultimately saw it as 'taking the easy way out' rather than truly thinking about what would happen after she died. In a way, I could understand his point of view; it was far easier to simply sign up for a death in the war rather than be part of the survivors who had to deal with the countless deaths and daunting future of rebuilding afterwards. If there was any solace to find there, it seemed to be a small sliver in how Jesse had changed her mind on how Mark viewed it; she understood that it was hard for Mark to admit that he wasn't sure how he would cope without her, and that he wanted the best for her regardless of how he and Turk would deal with it.

" _Ready?"_ I asked her that as my hands reached down to the twin shock pistols in my leg holsters, allowing the feeling of the thrumming pulse of the electricity running through the cold metal excite me for the fight ahead of us. With a wistful smile, she too grabbed her metal bow securely kept on her back - her finally ending the little rivalry between her and Joy, as she understood that losing the special bow would be worse than leaving it in the latter’s hands - before notching a shock arrow like she had been doing it for all of her life. _"Hell the fuck yes!"_

At the sharp signal that Jesse gave, we turned sharply to our left - heading East towards the battlecruiser rather than Opportunity to the South - the six of us storming towards the gradually growing pile of Alpha that were beginning to filter out of the wreckage located there.

Right as we skidded across the sand one of Jesse's rear team members (I believe his name was Hamish) seemed to get swarmed from the Rakk he had to storm across. Realising that he was in danger, I shifted my body around temporarily to shot a number of my pistols, with each shot striking a single Rakk directly in its chest. I managed to drop around seven or so of the flying beasts out of the sky, leaving the swarmed team member with a much more manageable amount of three; allowing that team member to just barely dodge the stomping of the hive coming after us.

 _"_ Stick together, we can't afford for the Rakk Hive to potentially get off course!" Jesse loudly instructed the others to stay close to her, especially after I ended up saving one of her straggling members. While it wasn't uncommon for the agitated wildlife to be headstrong in chasing one specific target, it was more common for them to be interested in large groups; which is exactly what we were aiming for.

Most of the Alpha that were trickling out of the battlecruiser were equally distracted with the massive army waiting for them in the desert plains and by the simple fact that they knew that storming against those in small clusters would do them nothing. That did mean there was a sizeable force simply waiting outside of the massive wreckage, and I made a beeline directly for them. As much as Alpha were considered to not be the sharpest tools in the shed, they were not complete morons in terms of noticing things going on around them; at least one or two noticing our approaching group of people... But it was more likely to be the massive quadrupedal hulking monstrosity behind us that drew their main focus.

"Enemies!" One of the Alpha called out to his allies, but his words got cut off from warning them any further from a sharp shot from Jesse's bow and arrow. "We've got-guh!"

With each Alpha in the opposing force (or at the very least, those that gathered outside their ship so far) now alerted to our presence, we didn't have enough ammo to really take out each single one that came spilling out. Not only did that mean the chances of getting the Rakk Hive stuck into the enemy forces was low, but we would be stopped on the edge of their forces rather than in the middle. As such, sacrifices had to be made.

My stronger Alpha legs were able to launch me a considerable distance into the air as I sprinted towards the opponents in front of me, soon able to use one of the broad shoulders of the men there to propel me even further into the air. By then I was well into a third of the army, but the others coming with me weren't as lucky.

Hamish, who had been besieged by Rakks before seemed to have tremendously bad luck, as he seemed to be swarmed by them all yet again. This time however, he took matters into his own hands before I could help him out, instead charging purposefully into a far off member of the army gathered there. Rakks were not as discerning as people often thought they were, so the moment the Alpha swung a punch in an attempt to hit the smaller Beta (which naturally ended up hitting a Rakk by accident, as they were both uncoordinated from the flurry of flying limbs/creatures) it caused absolute chaos between those two. It seemed that these enemy Alpha had better chemistry than I had initially expected, as that guys friends tried to get the swarm of angry dinosaur/bird creatures to leave him alone... Only to make things worse, as the creatures then spread around in their ranks like bugs infesting a steadily decaying corpse. Hamish was occasionally a bit clumsy, but he certainly had courage at the right times.

Two of the other girls tried to peel off from our middle group so that Jesse, myself and Ultea (the final third girl) would have an easier time slipping through the Alpha nearer to the middle. The Alpha there were more awake than some of their other brethren, grabbing the girls before they could get far, but helping them would yet again cause the same problems as before.

Jesse was able to dance between several Alpha that tried to grab her, but the Omega girl with her was not so lucky; as she seemed to stall ever so slightly in advancing through the army in front of her, which allowed the Rakk Hive to catch up with her. Realising her fate as the shadow of the hulking beast behind her towered over her, she decided to remain perfectly still, as she knew that it was now all left up to Jesse and I. Doing my best to ignore the sound of people being flung aside (one of which was undoubtedly Ultea), I kept hopping across the shoulders of the Alpha, trying my best to stay afloat above them like I was crossing a rushing stream.

With one more leap, I was able to glance backwards in worry for my pack member, as she was keeping her emotions perfectly buried even as some of the Alpha missed her with their grubby hands by mere millimetres. By that point the enemy had realised that our Rakk Hive was not a trained beast (as in, it wasn't going to leave if they just got rid of us), with several bits of Alpha starting to advance on it. Jesse and I had reached about the centre of the Alpha gathered outside of the battlecruiser, but the Rakk Hive was only about a small sliver through the troops. Whether it had been exactly our plan or not, it seemed to be the end of the road.

Twisting her body around just enough so that she could fire her shock arrow at the Hive still lumbering on the edge of the army, it sailed true directly into one of its eyes - sending several electric tremors throughout its body - irritating it bad enough to make it remained interested in her regardless of the Alpha underneath its feet. With calm precision, she flicked a switch on her device, making the purple diode flicker out on my teleporter... Effectively telling me that it was fine to leave whenever it was safe for me to do so.

Because she didn't have time to replace the arrow on her bow in order to fire it, she simply held the bow tightly in her hands like she was considering clubbing those around her if they got too close. With pride in my veins at the sight of her final stand, I flicked the switch on my device to teleport me to Phil across the sands.

With the purple light blinding my ocular senses for a split second, I reappeared at the same location that I had left; underneath the rock outcropping. Nothing seemed to have changed in my absence, which left me enough time to place my shock pistols back into my holsters and replace them with the spyglass. Even without my formerly elevated status, I could spy Jesse through the device as I lifted it to my eyes.

While she no longer had an arrow at the ready, she still leapt through the air in a similar vein as what I had done, using her bowstring to tightly wrap herself around one Alpha who came too close to her. Even as that one particular Alpha tried to scrabble with his hands to smack her off him, she simply twisted the bow sharply around akin to a garrotted wire, choking him where he stood. With the Rakk Hive rapidly approaching her, Jesse realised that on top of that Alpha's shoulders was effectively as much as she could be in the centre of the opposing force. And so, with a serene look on her face that reminded me of an old friend from long ago, she simply closed her eyes... And accepted her fate.

The eyeglass seemed to drop from my eye involuntarily, as much as it might have been respectful in some cultures to watch her final moments and burn those images within my mind. Just because I believed it was a worthy sacrifice for the cause, didn't mean that I was going to relish in peoples deaths; they deserved far better than that.

As Jesse seemed to complete her final task brilliantly, an ear piercing screech broke through on the radios above me. There truly was no rest for the wicked, as it seemed that my problems were truly starting.

"Ma'am, the communications seem to be down! We can't reach any of the teams!" Spek worriedly called out to Chris, that announcement coming at the exact same time as two little diodes flicked on for my teleporter. Both Danny and Lissa's diodes were flashing purple, which seemed to imply that they were the ones dealing with the interference causing group, likely from the split off escape pod army to our North. While Chris got busy with giving those two commands, I gave my own to Phil before Chris could speak over me.

 _"Phil, follow Chris' orders well. I'm going to be heading towards the North to help fix our communication lines"_ I informed Phil that I was leaving as soon as I was arriving, as it wasn't only the possibility of a pincer attack that worried me. There wasn't much point to me running around and helping out individual teams if I wasn't going to be quickly aware of who needed the assistance. But as much as it would be considered animalistic in every manner possible, I was absolutely going to relish more destruction against our foes before I had to return to my leadership role. _"Those fuckers are going to learn what happens when they think they can sneak behind my back"_


	12. On Pandora; The Speed of Sound

In an eye-blink, I was yet again in a completely different location; this time directly North of my army. It seemed that I was going to earn the same reaction almost each time this happened, as one of DL2 leaped away from me in a battle stance after she realised that there was someone within the purple light.

"Easy Ravvak, she's a special member of team Hermes" Danny was able to recognise me immediately, coming up with a far more believable reason for me to be there beyond 'just go with it'. Ravvak didn't seem to really remember me out of the massive team of Hermes, but she didn't argue with her superior officer simply because we had better things to be doing by that point in time. I wasn't the only one looking different however, as Danny's typical wild hair was contained in the tightest ponytail that he had ever managed to achieve, if only so that nothing would threaten his eyesight while he was on the battlefield. "Any messages?"

"Team Hermes is in overdrive because all of the communications are down" I explained it simply to him, making use of the fact that my mask muffled my voice in such a way that I sounded different to my natural tone. Danny's literal face didn't change at the news, but internally I could feel the frustration wash over me from him; he had been hoping that the disturbance was limited to his team and team Flight, but not further. "My team leader passed a message through our ranks - until it reached me - saying that the leader of the resistance believes that the disturbance is coming from the enemy troops North of her, and she wants it solved as soon as possible"

"Well, what better way to solve it faster than with us going to assist team Flight in person" Danny cajoled his team members into an excited frenzy, it being quite clear that they were just as eager to get into the fight as most others were. Because of their fast movements they were all perfect for dodging people in a fight, but most of the time they were waiting on the side-lines in practice bouts because team Hyena would get to the opponents before them... Well, not this time around. "I sure hope you can keep up with us"

I certainly saw those words for the challenge they were, waiting with a hidden smirk for just a second as I let him and his team of twenty troops charge off first to give them a head-start. They certainly were the faster members of our resistance, but I had a feeling that I would be able to beat them all with a little bit of effort on my part.

Once they were a sizeable distance away I slammed my feet into the ground, thundering after them across the desert sand. Within seconds I had caught up to their rearmost member - a particularly lanky Beta who had been assigned to DL2 for his agile strikes - and it didn't take me that much longer to be matching pace with Danny near the front of the group.

"Jesus Christ, I thought we had all the fast people in our team!" The rear member that I had passed seemed surprised to note that others in the army could keep up with them despite their prowess, but his other teammate was nowhere near as impressed as he was.

"Eh, she's probably an Alpha. There's no way an untrained person could keep up with us" His friend snorted, clearly thinking that it was more impressive to be either a Beta or Omega and achieve that kind of speed. Which I could wholeheartedly agree with; Alpha were unnaturally blessed in that regard after all.

"But if she is an Alpha, wouldn't she be included in team Hyena rather than Hermes? Not to mention we have very little female Alpha as it is" While that fact was absolutely the truth, none of them seemed to link the strange sense of communication and togetherness that Danny and I shared along with my particular class type and gender. If they had, perhaps they would have realised that I was more important than just a messenger.

"Cut the chatter people, we've got work to do" Danny quickly silenced the muttering going on with the other members of his team, and like good team members they obediently snapped their mouths shut. If anything, having me along for the ride was nothing but a bonus to their fight, even if it didn't make much sense to them. "Over this ridge and we should see the impact area. Split into groups of three once we have our targets"

We came storming over that aforementioned ridge as a wave, soon realising that things were a bit more frantic over there than had been realised. Far more of the pods had landed than I would have liked, several little interspersed groups of Alpha had leaked out of them like pus from a wound. The majority of those that had come out were holding heavy weaponry in their hands (rocket launchers, mini-guns, etc.), trying to fire upon the members of team Flight, who were swerving around in a mad frenzy to avoid their fire. In three different locations on that new battlefield seemed to be a set of three pylons, aiming high in the sky with what seemed to be massive purple crystals slowly bleeding out waves of interference; further protected from harm by a thin sheen of near-invisible force fields around them.

"Fling me up to one of the ships; I need to talk to the leader of Flight" I instructed Danny (or whoever was able to to the task I had ordered them to do), before relaxing my body so that they wouldn't have to fight with my own natural instinct. Within seconds Danny seemed to pick out one of the ships buzzing by above our heads, taking one of my arms and using that to throw me into the air - allowing me to intercept that one ship by grabbing onto its wing.

The pilot of that one ship clearly could hear the banging noise that came from me latching on, their heads turning around their ship to see what it was (after all, smacking into a solitary Rakk was the occasional hazard if someone flew so low in Pandora's atmosphere). I could hear the audible shriek they made once they saw my blustering black cloak, as well as the combined fact that I had steadily managed to climb up their wing until I was practically kneeling on their cockpit dome. But before they could determine that I was an enemy who had managed to leap aboard, I politely knocked on the dome to her cockpit... Which the pilot opened after a couple of seconds of doubt.

"Erm... Hello?" The pilot politely greeted me, despite their tone of voice clearly portraying that they didn't understand how I got there.

"I'm a special member of Hermes, don't worry" I began with that, seeing the clear sigh of relief and loss of tension in his shoulders. After all, I didn't want to run the chance that he would pull an aileron roll to get rid of me. "I need to speak to the leader of Flight. Can you tell me which one of these ships is hers, and bring me closer so that I can jump over to her ship"

"...Oh. I'm sorry to report this ma'am, but Alyssa's likely dead" Those words felt like an ice cold knife ramming into my heart, and it only got worse when I soon followed the gesturing finger of the pilot to spot a far off crumpled ship that had crashed into the sand off to the side of the battlefield. "She attempted to ram into the force field to see whether it would buckle under the pressure of physical pressure against our laser guns, but the force field pushed her into this zone between two of those pylons. Her ship didn't survive the two differing force fields pushing against each other"

The ship certainly looked like it had been crumpled up into a ball - akin to an old vehicle being dropped into a compacter - but that wasn't quite enough for me to believe it. I took a moment to flick back my cloak to look at my teleporter... Seeing that Lissa's diode had flicked off in the time it took me to arrive.

"...Ma'am?" The pilot nervously asked me if I was alright, as they could clearly notice that I wasn't pleased with the answer that they had given me, even if the only thing they could see on my face was my eyes due to my mask. But while it was the worst answer I could have expected, I still had to keep going. Sacrifices had to be made, and people had to keep going even if everyone I loved fell around me.

"What's your name?" I pointedly asked them in my authoritative voice, seeing them snap to attention once I took up my leadership role for a split second.

"I'm Sevin, ma'am" They barked their name back to me, only not daring to salute to me as their hands had to return to their controls so that they didn't slam into the ground or get shot down.

"After we've cleared up the fighting here and the communications are back up, you're being elevated to the new team leader for Flight. Understand?" After making sure that we would have some kind of successor after things were sorted out, and he eagerly nodded his head, I was getting right into destroying those infernal pylons. While before they were nothing more than an irritation to my fight, I now had a personal reason to want to tear them apart _personally._ "Did anyone see whether Lissa's attempt did anything?"

"Her ship did seem to get some kind of result ma'am, it flashed a bright purple colour for a split second after she contacted it" Sevin was right on task, filling in for several things that I would have been unable to see. "Her ship was not going so fast - just enough so that she could avoid the gunshots from the opposing ground troops - so perhaps it has to do with the speed?"

"Great work Sevin. Keep taking out the ground troops for me, I'll be working with DL2 to take down those pylons" I thanked the enthusiastic pilot, already beginning to slide down his ship's wing as he thanked me for my praise, my eyes scanning over the battlefield below us to see the best location to land.

DL2 had split reliably into groups of three as their leader had told them to, but the majority of them were busy ducking and dashing around the angry Alpha that littered the ground beneath me. A quick survey of the battlefield gave me some extra pieces of information that I hadn't seen before, as Pandora had far more rocky landscapes than the typical planet. Something that the Alpha couldn't have planned for when their pods launched from their malfunctioning ship was the fact that there was one large pillar of stone lingering on one side of the battlefield, and my estimation of its height meant that it was more useful than just background decoration for our fight.

Sliding myself off the ship right as it seemed to soar right over one bunch of the enemy, I purposefully kept my hands empty, as my shock pistols would only get in the way of my plans. I plummeted directly down from the ship, before feeling that my legs landed directly on the head of one of the opposing Alpha, feeling his head shatter into the ground with a thunderous crash.

" _Hell yeah, baby!"_ Danny happened to be in the group of DL2 nearest to where I landed, and I could easily hear his Alpha blood and mind respond to my violent gusto. Perfect, that just meant that he was listening better than ever to my instructions. _"So what's the plan? Take care of these Alpha and then use their weapons to take these stupid metal things out?"_

" _Danny, do you see that large pillar at the other side of the two pylons to our North?"_ I asked him that at the same time as I drove one of my legs directly into the chest of another enemy nearby me, watching with utter glee as he went flying into the nearest force field. True to what Sevin had described happening to Lissa's ship, that enemy ended up being flung around in a circle like a magnet, with him being trapped between the two deadly force fields. It was absolutely glorious to watch, but I of course had to be careful to not let it override my thoughts lest it distract myself or my pack member.

 _"Yeah, I see the pillar"_ Danny clearly picked up on which one I was referring to even without me having to gesture at it in the distance, multitasking thinking in tandem with me right as he elbowed one of his opponents in the face directly behind him. All it took was for me to imagine what I wanted to happen, which essentially played out like a video within his mind. Even before the movie-reel like thought finished in his mind, I could already spy the massive grin crossing his lips; animalistic in a manner that only Alpha with their love for fighting could seem to replicate. " _Sticks and stones may break their bones, eh? Rudimentary but deadly, just how we Pandorans work"_

 _"Don't let me down"_ My own smirk matched his own, but he was the only one who could feel the jittery excitement due to my mask. After all, I was the distraction so that Danny would be able to work with very little interference; the mayhem while he skulked around in the shadows. " _Would you like a boost on your way there?"_

 _"I thought you'd never ask"_ Like a duo act, he held out his arm in the very same manner as I had done before, allowing me to grasp his limp body and fling him directly over the heads of our enemies. He flew in such a straight path that most of the Alpha were utterly surprised that I would be throwing one of my allies, their attention now turned to me from my demonstration of monstrous strength. But of course, as long as I didn't throw him into one of the force fields, then he was going to be a force to reckon with even without my direct help.

A quick twirl on the spot allowed me to locate the remaining wreckage of Lissa's ship, it being flung just a bit away from the solitary pylon that wasn't quite lined up with the pillar like the other two were. While it likely had been by complete coincidence, I was hoping that she would not consider my final use of her ship to be like stomping on her grave.

"Ravvak, distract the enemy for me!" I commanded the girl who had originally seen me as an enemy, but she seemed to come to my defence at the drop of a hat. Pulling off a brilliant backflip right in the face of one of the enemies coming after me, I darted around another Alpha just to the left of them in my aim to reach Lissa's wreckage.

"Stop the one in black!" By that point fancy tricks seemingly wouldn't distract them from the fact that I was the most deadly out of the people there, with several Alpha soon coming after me once their comrade pointed me out. 

Even as I thundered over the sand there, one of the Alpha turned their heavy weaponry towards me, launching one of their grenades at me from their launcher. My Shephard's Cowl protected me just like the Vault from so long ago promised that it would do, the grenade bouncing off in place of it exploding as it would for anyone else. In fact, the Alpha coming from the other direction instead seemed to get it bounding towards his face, while I knew the shockwave wouldn't even affect me in the slightest.

The ships in team Flight had correctly identified that I was on their side - as well as the fact that I was the one in need of the most help - with one of the fighters dipping down out of their frenzied group to fire upon one of the Alpha on my right hand side. With a thumbs up to that ship as it soared back into the air, some part of me felt that it was Sevin coming around to help me like a true comrade; especially so when the ship tooted a horn at my expression of gratitude.

Finally reaching the wreckage, I uttered a quiet apology to the sneaky Beta that I knew had to be contained within - as well as her husband and twin daughters - before clutching onto it tightly with my phenomenally strong hands. Screaming with such an intense anger because of the enemy forcing me to do such a thing, I spun around tightly on one spot until I had built up enough energy to throw the lump of metal at high enough speed, before I threw the thing with all my might at the nearest pylon.

Like Sevin had described, the force field flashed a bright purple as the crumpled ship contacted it, almost looking like it was going to collapse in on itself with just a bit more force. It seemed to survive the very first hit, causing the ship to come bouncing back to me, which caused my leg to rear backwards.

 _"Christ Lissa, I'm sorry"_ I bit my lip in anger the moment my foot contacted her ship, putting all of my energy into the kick.

The ship went sailing back in record time, crashing through the force field with a massive shattering noise like glass. With nothing to stand in its way, the ship seemed to slam right into the fragile metal construct, breaking the stupid thing right in half. The topside of the pylon ended up falling directly onto the ground, destroying the purple crystal that likely was giving us so much trouble, and I couldn't have been happier.

"They've destroyed one of our teledestroyers!" Beyond the fact that their name for the device was ridiculous in the first place (honestly, what was that name supposed to be? A mashup of the words telecommunication and destroyer?), the Alpha against us quickly realised that they couldn't just ignore the possibility of us breaking through their force fields, with several of them converging on the final remaining two as though to protect it.

Ravvak and the others glanced over to me, as though to ask me if I was going to be doing the same trick as I had before. They seemed to be listening to what I would order them to do without a single thought, so I calmly held up my hand to tell them not to advance onto the two pylons... Nor was I going to be throwing Lissa's ship again. All we had to was wait patiently, and we would be answered with our own brand of karma.

"TIMBER!!!" Danny's massive shout punched through the timber, but it was less of a warning to our enemies and more of a signal to me that my glorious vision was going to come through. And if I had thought that his call was big, then the earth shattering loud crumbling noise of the pillar dwarfed his voice in every manner.

The entire stone pillar came tumbling down like a massive stony arm, with the long shadow it made stretching out over the two pylons. Danny had managed to chip away at the base of the pillar in just the right location that it would come down directly on the force fields and the pylons directly within them. And while the Alpha would have been able to catch the pillar if they had been paying attention to it, the pylons were far taller than any of them were; which meant that unless they could come up with something on the fly in under three seconds, then they were doomed.

Those three seconds passed by with the Alpha unable to come up with anything beyond getting directly out of the way to not be crushed, the long stony pillar flinging up several metric tonnes of sand and dust into the air as it crashed into the fray. I took absolute glee in the shattering noises ringing out from both the broken force fields and crystals breaking into a million pieces, those noises being accompanied by a similar ear piercing noise from the portable receiver that I kept on my shoulder.

"Communications are back online" Chris reported to me, as he was the person I was directly linked to. With a thankful breath in, I relished in the fact that was another problem solved... But now I had to get right back onto everything.

"The leadership has been transferred from Lissa over to Sevin in team Flight, the former has fallen in battle" I quickly communicated that to him while I had a moment from the enemy being disoriented. I knew that I couldn't pick favourites in this fight, but that didn't change that Lissa had been a pack member of mine who I adored with all of my heart, and talking about her death casually did sting more than I had hoped. "Every other member of Flight and DL2 are alright. Order the latter to return to their station at the entrance to the Vault cave, and let the remainder of Flight handle the stragglers up here"

"Yes Ma'am" Chris was right on it, leaving me with just enough time to check the diodes on my teleporter, thankfully seeing that all of its diodes were not on by that point. Unfortunately for me, it seemed that the fight truly was beginning to happen without me present. "Hydra is reporting that their planetary cannon is nearly ready to fire, Dan and team Cy have their sights on some Alpha filtering into their ravine to the North-North-West, Opportunity is being overrun by Alpha filtering out of the battlecruiser and we're having some small bits of troops approaching our front lines"

"Tell Hydra to fire upon the battlecruiser still stationed in the sky once they're ready, I'd much rather not deal with more of their infernal escape pods. Have team Cy keep an eye on the ravine and report further in if they need assistance there" I started to list off everything that he told me about, trying to patch up things long before I teleported back to the battlefield where the others would need me. "I'm returning to Phil right underneath your feet in a couple of moments, so I'll monitor the troops approaching our front lines. And if those posh bastards from Opportunity ask for help once they're being overrun, tell them to go to hell"

I gave a quick wave to Danny as I saw him approaching through the dust, making sure that he and his team were fine before I flicked the teleporter to take me back to Phil. Telling him about Lissa would only distract him, and I could only hope that it was well gone from my mind by the time I returned directly back to her husband. The moment after the fight was done when I had to tell people about their missing husbands and wives were going to be the most brutal, and I dearly hoped that this wasn't the extent of my physical interference in this fight... Not when I had so much more frustration to vent and heads to beat in.


	13. On Pandora; Into the Depths

Flashing underneath the rock outcropping, I had a clear view to the rapidly approaching enemy troops. So far my spyglass told me that their troops were largely focused on taking over Opportunity to our West-West-South, but I knew that the main weaponry and guns of that city were unable to fire upon our troops because of the several ravines in our way. That position of theirs would only be useful for them if they stubbornly stayed within the city, and that would only come if they didn't trample all of the machinery under their feet when they took it over. All in all, I didn't think any of that was likely, but I kept it as a possibility in the back of my mind.

 _"Snip is asking for permission to fire at any approaching troops"_ Chris was still siphoning the more important decisions over to me, while he answered for the more mundane ones that didn't concern me.

 _"Permission granted"_ I quite clearly thought that to him, as waiting forever for the heavier duty troops would just end up causing more havoc for our front line troops. The shielding needed to get intermittent time to recover from the battering they undoubtedly would receive, and being fired upon by a league of snipers would make the Alpha who followed behind the first wave more cautious; allowing even more time for them to be taken out before reaching us. _"Inform them that priority should be given to troops nearing any of team Spar, or for any heavier weaponry such as rocket launchers or machine guns. The latter takes precedence if both scenarios were to appear"_

 _"And if they run out of bullets for their long range weapons?"_ Chris asked before he ordered the decision, as while we had been stockpiling weapon and bullets for a long time, there hardly was the likelihood that we had enough for every single enemy.

 _"Then they should be joining team Arc for added accuracy, with some small amounts joining in team Ban once the injured start showing up"_ I decided on the fly, as doing the most amount of damage took the forefront of my thoughts rather than patching up everyone. We had enough of Ban to deal with little bits in between our fight, but heavy duty medical help and triage could only take place once we didn't have to worry about the enemy advancing on our medical tents.

The moment Chris passed on the message to Snip via Spek, I could hear the sound of a heavy sniper rifle firing a round; the bullet zipping through the air with an audible _zzt!_ through the air. At the very end of its trail it buried itself into one of the heads of our enemies, causing their head to explode in a gory mess; splattering blood and guts over their allies close by. It was glorious, but I didn't have time to be enjoying the well-trained marksman shooting gallery.

"Hydra is reporting that they are having difficulty in rising from underneath the ocean ma'am" I managed to pick up Mathilda saying that to Chris long before he had to think it to me, which was a huge problem in the long run of our fight. The planetary cannon was irreplaceable; especially so in terms of shooting down the two battlecruisers that still housed plenty of our enemies.

As Chris tried to think of what he exactly was supposed to be saying in response to that, I checked my teleporter for any sign that Ninja Brian had called for me. He certainly had; his diode was the only one lit at that point in time, and we had enough support from team Snip to keep the enemy at bay while I could fix that.

 _"Phil, get me a reinforced Oz kit; I'm going to need it to help Ninja Brian with the planetary cannon"_ I told the waiting leader of Hermes hovering nearby me, purposefully keeping the memory of his recently deceased wife in the recesses of my mind. But it seemed that my effort was in vain; as he nodded his acknowledgement I could feel the cloying despair settling in the back of his mind... He had already read Chris' mind when I had told him that the leadership had been changed around in team Flight. Even so, he kept his spirits up; his twin daughters needed him to win this fight; preferably with him still kicking.

 _"Yes Ally"_ Phil obediently obeyed my command, despite the fact I could feel in his mind that he wanted to know more about his wife's death. Even with that ticking away in his mind, I was proud of the fact he put away those feelings in place of his comrades lives. Within seconds he managed to snag one of the spare kits that the team of Ban carried around in emergencies, and handed it to me. " _You're heading out again?"_

 _"I'll be fixing the problem with Hydra; we really need their planetary cannon up and operational"_ I prioritized putting on the Oz kit at the back of my neck, as I certainly wasn't going to be able to help the aforementioned team if I didn't have some form of portable air. There was a sliver of a worry in the back of my mind that Phil didn't want me charging off in case they needed me, but when I poked a little more within his mind, I found that he actually was relieved with me helping people within my team; far more than if I was standing stationary on that rock outcropping and barking orders. _"You and Chris should turn your diodes on if you need me before I'm done, as my receiver is waterproof but it does not work underwater"_

I got an affirmation both from the leader of the communication team and from the man taking my place, before I let my teleporter take me to Ninja Brian. Even before the purple light enveloping me disappeared, I could feel the sudden rush of water surrounding my body as I floated in the water. Compared to the searing heat of the Pandoran sun the water felt ice cold in comparison, but there was a vague hint of heat from the little bits of light that filtered through the deep blue colour surrounding me.

My Oz kit activated instantly the moment it couldn't detect a breathable atmosphere, bunching up a bunch of my hair into the bubble as it often would do in the past. After taking a short moment to rearrange my cloak hood and my hair out of my eyes, I pulled my hands back so that I was able to see the people on that underwater platform clearly.

 _"It's good that you're here"_ Ninja Brian greeted me as soon as he saw the teleportation light appear in his vision, gently lifting himself out of the gunner's seat that he had been manning. His allies all around the platform of the cannon seemed to be relieved once they saw Ninja Brian's (admittedly hard to notice) relaxed attitude, concluding correctly that there was no way that I could be an enemy if their leader was fine with me. _"One of my team had already figured out what the problem is below us. The platform won't raise because one of the lower metal beams snapped and got lodged within the mechanism that lifts the platform"_

 _"The missing metal beam won't be a problem at all?"_ I asked him as the both of us started to float over to one edge of the platform, where he soon gestured slowly in the water to something poking out of one of the spring loaded legs. It certainly seemed to be wedged in tight; the spring being so tightly wound that it acted like a vice on the metal stuck there. No wonder he had been so pleased with me arriving; as I remembered that the entire team on Hydra was comprised entirely of Beta and Omega, who didn't have enough strength to pull against a spring that was around ten times their size.

 _"It had been added at the last minute; support beams that had been stapled on without much care. They didn't take the pressure in going back down so well, but the other one just like it broke off in a different direction without interfering with our machine"_ Ninja Brian explained, which at least solved that possible conundrum. But while one problem got sorted, there was one more lingering one that propped up, painting the problem as not quite so simple as someone tugging out a piece of metal. _"It's far enough down that the Oz kits cannot handle the pressure. If you drop down to that level, then the oxygen bubble will shatter and not work until you raise up to a pressure that it can handle"_

_"How far down can I go before it shatters?"_

_"Around three metres up from the metal beam"_

That wasn't as bad as I had expected, as the metal beam looked to be around twelve meters down from the platform we loosely floated over. With no other real solution present to me, I kicked off from the platform and started to swim down to the problem bit of machinery while feeling that Ninja Brian followed right behind me.

Suddenly going from the bright light of the desert to the dark colours of the deep was eerie, especially so when the creaking of the spring right next to me gave an uncomfortable feeling of ambiance. It was how I had imagined divers had lived; exploring the deepest parts of our solar systems oceans and the ocean planet Zura, perhaps even swimming in between old sunken wrecks. Ninja Brian on the other hand, seemed to have something completely different on his mind.

" _Pandora doesn't have any dangerous ocean creatures, right?"_ He asked me, and part of me really wondered how many people in his team actually got to see the cheeky side of him.

 _"Not as far as I am aware"_ I answered him honestly, and I swear that I could audibly hear the sound of him snickering through his black mask and his oxygen bubble. But just as quickly as he started, he flicked back to his serious mode as we neared the beam. " _I'm going to try pulling it a little, and then coming back up for air when I need it. If I wave frantically at you, then that means that I need help"_

 _"Don't take any chances; I'd much rather have you alive and get the cannon up a minute or so later rather than the other way around"_ Ninja Brian lectured me like he was my father (somewhat ironically, as he was about twenty-two years older than me), but there was no way that I was going to force him to burn my body after my death. He didn't deserve that for surviving everything he had - as surviving to an age of sixty was impressive on the harsh land of Pandora - and making him burn my body would be akin to a child of his dying an early death.

As I dipped below the approximate point that Ninja Brian had pointed out to me before, I could notice the obvious wobbling and shimmering that was unusual for normal working Oz kits. Taking a deep breath in while I still could, I forced my legs to kick myself even further down, feeling the Oz kit shatter right as I cleared the final three metres keeping me away from the metal beam.

The instant it was able to, the water rushed into my head, smacking my head as that the water had a mind of its own and it was attempting to punish me for entering its domain. My eyes were struggling to make sense of the blurry, dark water around me, but at the very least I could feel the cold, hard feeling of the metal beam underneath my fingertips.

Not daring to waste my very first attempt, I wrapped my arms around the metal and allowed my legs to kick in the opposite direction to pull the interfering object out. Both the spring and the metal beam made their own noises from that movement as if to protest my involvement, the spring creaking further while the beam screeched into my ears... But it didn't budge enough to come out from the spring. My muscles weren't able to use their full extent while I was in the water, not while I didn't have a proper purchase with my feet.

With my first lungful expended, I used the metal beam as a gentle pushing off point so that I could reach the three metre mark faster, my oxygen bubble reappearing so that I was able to see - but more importantly, breath.

 _"I'm probably going to have to go closer to the spring, otherwise I won't have a good grip or purchase"_ I informed him of what I was going to do before I went back down, taking my hands into my oxygen bubble for a second to wipe the little remaining water from my eyes. I had to be able to see the general direction of where the beam was, lest I accidentally miss it and swim down far too far than was safe for myself or my pack member.

 _"Just make sure your hair doesn't float into the spring mechanism while you're down there"_ He fiddled a little with my hair as he said that, filtering the wet strands out of my way so that I could see clearer through the bubble. " _You may look like a mermaid with your hair floating all around you, but it's not very pleasant when it gets caught"_

 _"Just like a cloak or cape getting caught in a ship engine"_ I joked a little bit, but I was going to be careful that neither item was going to get caught in the machine. Being that one person in the war to die by drowning while everyone was getting bloody on the battlefield would be just embarrassing. _"Here I go"_

Another deep breathe in, and down I went. This time I aimed closer towards the spring rather than being far out, so that when my bubble popped yet again, I could manage to find the right location.

Because I knew what to expect the second time I didn't even need a second to recover from the water slap happening, instead wrapping my arms tight yet again around the protrusion. With my legs coming into contact with the spring, I finally managed to have a good amount of strength to put my Alpha muscle into action.

One giant heave, and that almighty screeching was right back into my ears yet again, but I could feel what felt like a third of the beam come towards me. I dared to pull once more because I didn't feel the need to come up for air just yet, and the metal beam had no choice but to relent to my strong grip.

 _"It looks like you only need one more pull"_ Ninja Brian was able to fill me in on what I couldn't see, as the three meters separating us wasn't enough to strain our trusty pack link. Because of his guidance, I took the decision to pull once more on the metal beam, heaving with another sturdy pull.

With that last amount of strength, I was able to pull the beam completely free, letting the spring slam shut into its correct position. Directly onto my right foot.

"AAAHHH!" I couldn't help but scream a moment after I could hear the bones in my foot snap, right as the monumental pain shot up my leg and into my brain. Even as I shouted in pain it came out in a muffled capacity - not only because of my muzzle, but also because the water threatened to silence me in that abyss - my hands immediately shooting out in a panicked manner to try and pull my foot back out.

My foot wouldn't come out no matter how hard I pulled; it was wedged in tight. Pulling harder would only result in me pulling my leg loose from my ankle, as my muscle and strength outshined my body's capacity for damage. Even though losing a foot felt like it would be the stupidest thing to happen, it seemed like that was what I had to do unless I wanted to die in a watery grave... Until a pair of oddly calm hands came to rest on my shoulders.

 _"It's alright, I've got you"_ NinjaBrian assured me that everything was going to be fine, flooding my mind with a heavy dose of relaxing emotions and assurances that the pain would leave soon. Despite the fact that I knew that he hated romance or sexual attraction in any capacity, I could feel him tilt my head back so that he had a better view before covering my mouth with his and supplying me with a lungful of air. Before he darted back upwards to get himself more air however, he carefully maneuvered my tense hands over to two specific springs, before angling those hands in such a manner that I could pull the springs apart without having to look. " _Pull those apart, and I'll be right back to help you swim up to safety"_

Taking special care to not lose my grip after he floated back up to relative safety, I pulled apart those two springs apart - the metal creaking as always with my effort - and I had to do my best to not cringe from the blood rushing back to my injured foot once the metal was off it. Carefully pulling back my foot and ensuring that my hair and/or cloak weren't going to get stuck next, I pulled my hands back and let the spring snap back into place without having some bodily part stuck in between it.

Thanks to my pack member coming back only a couple of seconds after he must have gotten his breath back, I didn't have to kick with my right leg at all; the two of us steadily rising with my left leg and both of his. Even as the white hot nerves seemed to pump fiery pain into my mind, Brian made sure that we ascended slowly so that neither of us could get decompression sickness. His seasoned experience in being a pack member meant that he kept giving me calming waves from his mind, which seemed to help ease the pain ever so slightly.

"I... I need to get back to the others at the battlefield" I struggled to speak through my gritted teeth, my sharp canines rubbing against each other to try and keep the pain at bay even after my Oz kit started to work properly once more. "Team Ban should have something to fix my foot"

 _"If you teleport back, you'll certainly give yourself the bends"_ Ninja Brian wasn't having it, which likely meant that I was going to have to stay with team Hydra until we rose to the surface along with the platform and the planetary cannon in kind. I could only hope that someone in his team had some kind of first aid with them, unless they were willing to deal with me being irritable the whole way up.

"Ninja Brian, the platform can start it's gradual rise now" One of his team members reported to Ninja Brian the moment we reached the edge of the platform, him not using any formal titles likely because I could imagine my pack member telling them to cut it out. Probably because he thought titles were unimportant, or simply from the fact that he hated idle chatter.

"Make it rise" Always a man of few words, he purposefully kept his sentences super short, picking the right amount of words so that he wouldn't have to waste time. As he gently released me near the edge of the platform and floated towards the gunners seat yet again, he twisted his back just slightly so that people could see him gesturing at me before he spoke next. "Treat her"

"Hello ma'am" The very same team member switched over to helping me, floating over like he had been living underwater his whole life. They really had trained well to be working on this station, but my pride was momentarily overshadowed by my infernal foot. "My name is Paulo, how can I help you?"

"Do you have any instant health vials?" I asked him, hoping to the high heavens that he had one of them on him despite his station being far away from the battlefield. To my eternal disappointment, he frowned ever so slightly and shook his head at me; as their station couldn't allow anything that could possibly shatter due to the pressure. "In that case, I'd appreciate you lot pretending I'm not here while I sit in pain here"

He was more than happy to do that for me; floating back off to his post next to the controls lifting and lowering the entire construct. His friends did the very same, politely turning away and completely ignoring me as I cradled my foot and sat near the edge of the platform.

Clenching my teeth just a bit more while assuring myself that it wouldn't take that long before I could get some proper medical attention, I soon felt the platform confidently rising like there wasn't a problem in the first place. It was actually kind of beautiful for a split second; the light beginning to filter more strongly though the water, warming us all up like we were on a tropical beach. My foot also appreciated the warmth, as it caused my tense muscles to relax ever so slightly.

"Platform raised to first level; take your tablets" Paulo called out after we rose a decent way up, before floating over to me as the rest of his team took small blue and green pills from a waterproof capsule around their necks. While staring off into the distance - to keep to his promise of ignoring me - in his hand was one of the very same pills that he stuck into his mouth. "Remember guys, these pills speed up the decompression process to a couple of seconds rather than a period of minutes"

Something told me the reminder was not at all for any of his other team members, as all of them smiled softly to themselves with a conspiring look together. It was all for my sake, and I took the pill gratefully.

"Thank you Paulo" I thanked him as I carefully peeled back my mask to swallow the pill, and even my foot couldn't seem to dull the laughter that came from my lips once I heard his response.

"You're very welcome mysterious sea ghost!" He answered while still staring above my head, and I had to cover my mouth to ensure that the pill wouldn't come right back out. Without missing a beat, he turned right back around and went back to his station, preparing us for our next level of ascension after a couple of seconds passed by. "Second level"

By that point the water was no longer a deep dark blue, instead more of a calm blue that I typically would associate with the ocean. But even so, I couldn't wait to reach the surface where we could terrorise the enemy once more.

"Third level" Paulo raised us once more, with all of us starting to feel the typical pull of gravity unlike the way water would have a weird space like feel on us. I knew that this was the level that the cannon had been waiting on the very first time we called it, so we only had a single more level to go before we could fire.

Despite my foot, I used the last bit of our presence in the water to swim over to the gunners seat, so that I was able to grab onto the seat with one of my hands. Using it for support along with my good leg, I patted Ninja Brian on the shoulder; letting him know that I was there both physically and mentally behind him.

" _Give them absolute hell"_ I could feel the way I hissed within my mind, but even with that animosity he could tell that I was more than ready. With him confidently gripping the controls in his hands, he stared down the aiming controls with precision.

"Fourth level" With Paulo's final announcement, we breached the water's surface, hitting the hot familiar air of that desert sun. The water rushed off our platform with such a speed that the water turned white as it cascaded over the sides, but my attention was paying attention to the sky above us. "Mathilda, Hydra is firing. I repeat, we are firing"

Ninja Brian swivelled around in his seat until the cannon was aiming directly at the battlecruiser still stagnating in the sky, before sharply pressing his thumbs down on the buttons to fire it. The cannon had a display on the side of it that I couldn't see while on my rock outcropping the very first time it fired, which steadily built up with the very same bright white light I recognised. Opening my mouth at the same time as the rest of the team there, we felt the heavy _WHUM!_ of the cannon up close, absolutely exciting every part of my body (except for my foot, of course).

That beam of light shot through the air directly into the front of the battlecruiser, causing the entire construct to shatter into several hundreds of pieces. It was that extra bit of special flavour in my mind to imagine the panic coming from the Alpha right when they realised that they were screwed.

 _"We're going to have to drop down again"_ Ninja Brian explained before I got completely side-tracked, allowing me to feel the heat of the cannon right after it had fired. I didn't even have to put my hands on it; I could feel the heat radiating off it like it was a miniature version of the fucking sun. _"You should now get that foot checked out"_

 _"That was the plan"_ I sarcastically answered, carefully shifting my weight so that I was able to find my teleporter while hopping on my left foot. Ninja Brian did me the favour of turning off his diode long ago, which meant that I now had free reign to go to whoever I pleased... And my foot was begging for me to choose Jade out of everyone despite her not being anywhere near close to the rock outcropping. _"If you somehow get something stuck in the spring again when you guys descend; I swear to whatever deity that exists that I will kill you"_

" _I'd likely kill myself long before you got to me"_ He easily joked right back to me, but he could detect that my pain made my threat come across as ever so slightly serious... But once it was gone, he knew just as well as anyone that I would never lay my hands on someone who didn't deserve it. As Paulo started up the initial descent for their machine - and the water began to rush back onto the platform - I was more than happy to leave that watery place far behind me with the flick of a switch.


	14. On Pandora; Ride or Die

The sands of Pandora were comforting to me in more ways than just one, as it softened my impact from the moment I teleported over to Jade. If I had been unlucky enough to be walking around without my mask or my disguise on then getting my foot fixed up would have to wait until the fighting was done, as the troops seeing me injured would deal a blow to morale; no matter how small that amount would end up being. As such, I was happier than ever to be wearing that soggy wet black outfit, gently limping my way over to my old friend.

 _"Ally! I wasn't expecting to see you so early at this point during the war"_ Jade eventually noticed me approaching, my attempts to hide my injury showing fruit when she figured out only a second later that there was something wrong in the first place. Even then, it was because of the pain thrashing through my mind more than anything else; with her just barely hiding her startled shock. " _Oh my flipping goodness, what happened to your foot?!"_

 _"Giant spring from the planetary cannon"_ I kept it brief, planting my butt down onto the sand so that the pressure came off my legs and subsequently my feet. She came over to inspect my foot, while I did my best to not cringe or punch the sand underneath me when she pressed her fingers in various spots. _"How many instant health vials is that going to take?"_

 _"At least six. One to get the pieces of your Cuneiforms, Navicular and Talus back together, two subsequent to heal and strengthen those bones, two more for the fixing of your muscles and the final one just to be certain to get rid of any bruising"_ Jade certainly had been learning well from Jack, as twenty years ago I doubt she would have been able to list those bones in their Latin names... Nor would she have kept a straight face when asked to recite 'phalanges'. I gave her a loose wave of my hand, telling her that I just wanted her to get on with it. _"I'll insert it into the side of your ankle so that it won't affect your capacity to walk"_

Any kind of hope that I held - the kind that was seeking some momentary peace to fix my foot before I had to shoot off to another location - seemed to be ill-placed, as my ears could keenly pick up the sound of a truck revving off in the distance. Jade obediently ignored everything around her in place of taking care of my injury, which allowed me to pick up the receiver on my shoulder to contact Chris... While trying to not focus on my bones wriggling underneath my skin.

"Chris, where is that truck going? It seems to be heading North-West of our current location" I asked him while speaking softly, as it wouldn't do for me to shout with my natural voice through the receiver and give things away to Spek or Mathilda.

"That's PJ. Dan had requested backup for his team at the ravine, because he thinks we're better off causing a collapse to shut off their access to the battlefield that way" He responded in the same quiet tone, the both of us essentially sounding like a form of an echo into a canyon from our similar sounding voices. Everything he was saying made sense; funnelling our enemy into only coming through one location was far better than letting them do whatever, and then we would even have team Cy back to assist in various tasks. "My plan is to send DL2 to watch over things there once PJ's truck handles things there, as that team will be able to get around the ravine even after the explosion"

It added up to quite the well thought out plan, there was no denying that. I didn't answer quite yet, flipping open my cloak for a split second to look at the diodes before I would feel comfortable answering him. Neither Dan nor PJ had called for me, their diodes still completely colourless like all of the others were at that time... But there was a niggling feeling in the bottom of my gut that I needed to be there anyway. Even with a sturdy amount of troops now approaching team Spar at the front lines, we would be doomed if the enemy could come streaming through that ravine, so I wanted to stamp out that possibility before it could happen.

"I'm going to be accompanying PJ over there" I firmly instructed Chris, leaving no room in my tone of voice for any kind of argument against that plan. Jade could hear that just as well as my second in command could, so she seemed to switch into a second gear; placing multiple instant health vials into my leg above the first one to speed up the healing process even faster. It usually was not recommended to do so because of the massive wave of euphoria that would hit people, but we were crunched for time. "As for your plan, it sounds good so far. Keep me posted in case something changes"

Jade plucked out the needles of the vials in a row like they were simple pins from a pincushion, and almost immediately my amped up body fixed the holes that those left behind without a single bit of blood leaving my body. As though I had never gotten injured in the first place, I was able to stand up and kick my leg in various directions without so much as a tingle of pain, and frankly I felt great! Although that latter part might have been because of the endorphins flooding my system.

 _"Take care"_ Jade managed to tell me that right before I flipped my teleporter on to go towards the new developing situation to our North-West, leaving her just as quickly as I had arrived. Arguably she was in the best position possibly - near the rear of the army where the Alpha were unlikely to reach her at all - but that didn't mean that I didn't worry for her.

The teleporter brought me reliably to PJ, directly atop his moving truck. Clamping my hands onto the sides of it so that I wouldn't go flying off in case he tried to fling me off, it felt far too familiar to a time twenty years prior; when I lost a good friend in a truck crash. Flipping calmly so that I was able to hang onto the side of the cabin rather than the roof, PJ could easily make out who I was now that I was more visible than my roof thumping entrance could tell him.

 _"Thank goodness, I'll have a little muscle to back me up"_ PJ wasn't worried about why exactly I was hitching a ride with him, as his truck had quite the valuable cargo aboard. _"Not that I think that the enemy will be able to tell that I have explosives in here, but you know how they are"_

 _"Yep, I know. Alpha go for the big target because they think they'll enjoy the challenge"_ I wasn't at all insulted by his generalising remark; it was something I would do too if I had no responsibilities in a fight as well. As much as there was a sarcastic part of me that wanted to just stand back and let the Alpha go ham on the truck - and subsequently see them splat into little meaty bits from the ensuing explosion - that wasn't what this specific set of wheels was supposed to be for. _"Your own teleporter works?"_

 _"You bet it does. I'm not planning on dying in an explosion if it's preventable, Kyanna would be absolutely livid"_ PJ joked, but his hands still reached over to touch his device in a nervous manner; to double check that it certainly did work. It beeped confidently back at him once it registered his touch, which was a relief not just to him but to myself as well. Jack had made them well, not just for me but for everyone who was in a situation where they could use the hasty exit.

I let him be as we approached the entrance to the ravine, as he would need the concentration to be able to surge through that craggy place at high speeds without crashing into the walls. Even better, I flipped back up onto the roof of the truck so that he wouldn't have to take me into account on the sides of the truck, keeping myself flattened on that metal to hide until the last moment where I could enter the fight.

The moment PJ swerved around the first curve of the ravine we already were able to see team Cy battling against a number of Alpha, with more of the large Alpha coming around from the next corner beyond that. Dan had possibly taken a little too long to ask for help, as even with DL2 coming to help - with them taking a bit before they could arrive at the ravine - we would have a difficult time repelling them in slow movements.

 _"Looks like we're doing it quick and dirty"_ I hoped that PJ was able to hear my thoughts despite the metal separating us, and it felt like he could when the truck decelerated ever so slightly. With that giving me a bit of a gap to leap off the front of the truck, I was certainly going to be getting into the thick of it.

Pushing off from the truck allowed me to get quite a bit of air, landing on one of the very furthest Alpha's back; before quickly pumping up my leg to kick sharply backwards, smashing their head in with my heel. PJ was forced to come to a halt lest he run over the other members of team Cy, so I had to coordinate with the others to let him proceed through the ravine.

While Dan was the one leading the team, it was clear that his cybernetic enhancements didn't reach any further than his eye; as the rest of his team had either gotten their extra robotic limbs from Jack fixing up their lifelong injuries, or (for the truly dedicated) because they had volunteered to remove their arms, legs and other parts to improve from the limited capabilities of blood and bone. He was an integral part of it however, as his robotic right eye was directly linked to the electronic glasses that all other members of his team were wearing, sending signals to them if his eye could pick up something that they couldn't. Whether it be from a slight limp in one leg or from someone favouring their right side compared to their left, each piece of information improved the possibility of a team member being able to handle their enemy correctly.

" _Tell your team to push forward; PJ really needs to get far further into the canyon"_ I didn't waste time in telling him what I expected him to do, almost wanting to snap my fingers to bring the people under his instruction to attention. In return, I could feel that he just managed to conceal his smile once my familiar cloak fluttered into view, truly being relieved and pleased in equal amounts once I arrived. " _For the more curious members of your team who may ask who I am, you can give them the excuse that Jack sent over one of team Hyena to help PJ out"_

 _"_ All team members, we're moving forward!" Dan sharply called out to the others following behind him, simultaneously managing to line up his heavy pistol and fire a number of shots; felling three Alpha who were advancing towards us. Those Alpha that were still advancing on us didn't have any weapons to use against us, but it was never a good idea to underestimate the enemy even if it seemed like a sure win for us. "Take care of the lingering Alpha at the back and then advance!"

While I could easily act as the person staying behind to slaughter the Alpha separated from their main group, I knew that I was best utilized at the very front of the team moving forward; acting as the spear tip piercing through the layer of enemies. Using my Shephard's Cowl to my advantage, I stormed forward as though I was a massive bruiser, slamming my shoulder into the very first Alpha and using him as a glorified bullymong-catcher. Even with that one Alpha trying to punch me in the head consecutively, all of his blows ended up bouncing off my cloak hood like he was attempting to punch right through the hardest substance in the universe.

As I got in the thick of a bunch of Alpha who came all as one group, I threw the Alpha against my shoulder into the air so that I was able to grab his feet, before swinging him around to use him as a mace. I only dared to release him from my grasp when I was certain that he had enough brain damage to ensure that he wouldn't get up after I let go, letting him slam into the nearby ravine wall. All the while this was happening, Dan was picking off stragglers away from the bunch that I was handling, his expert marksmanship and communication preventing us from ever going after the same opponents.

 _"Two on your right"_ He told me within his mind, planting a bullet in their heads long before their grubby hands could even rise in my direction. But even though I felt the two of us could have gotten plenty done with just the two of us, his team members soon came charging over once they saw the destruction our twosome were making; further excited from the chance to strike back.

One member of his came vaulting over his head due to their bionic legs (Mickey, I believe his name was), his improvements being compromised of not only his legs but also a massive chest made of several intertwining metal plates. He soon came leaping past me as well - his grand display was not supposed to include me after all - before coming to a halt in the midst of another cluster. Keeping my eye on him to ensure that he wouldn't get into trouble, I got a brilliant front-row seat to him taking a deep breath in... Before his chest plate seemed to open like some demented Venus fly trap, blowing what seemed to be a veritable hurricane amount of air in a sphere around him. Forget my tiny little air grenade, this amount of air was enough to throw all of his opponents against the ravine walls instantly - I even might have had my own hood flip off if I hadn't brought my hands up to grab onto it.

While I was blown away (in both meanings), another team member came crawling - quite literally! - right above my head. Hento had been a paraplegic from birth, and frankly had spent most of his life pushing himself around in a wheelchair until he came to Jack; who proceeded to make him a harness that gave him eight extra-long legs with sharp spikes on the end that made him look closer to a spider than a human. Danny had actually asked him to join DL2 because of his extreme mobility, but Hento had decided to go with Dan simply because the latter knew how it felt to be able to function yet again after getting some help in terms of robotics.

The Alpha tried to punch out one of his long legs, but they missed quite easily simply because Hento had his brain directly linked to the legs. Forget them being able to touch him, he was able to practically dance around them and skewer very delicate parts of their body with ease. I truly was grateful he was not with the enemy, as even I would have had some difficulty in grabbing him.

 _"An ideal location to bring the walls of the ravine down is around the next curve"_ Dan informed me, making a gentle snaking gesture with his free hand to indicate what he was referring to. We likely would still need to get DL2 in there to ensure that the Alpha wouldn't just dig out the rocks slowly by hand, but Dan knew the place much better than I did. _"It's quite easy to spot; it's the narrowest point of the ravine"_

Right as it sounded like we could just storm around the corner with every member of his team flanking us, another person came bounding back over to us after she took a peek around that curve. She didn't have any kind of improvements on her legs but her arms were made of these beautiful glass constructed cylinders, which she used to her advantage by going into some kind of handstand, before using the built up power in her arms to launch herself forward into a flip; clearing the distance between us with a flourish of her bright orange curls.

"Dan! The Alpha coming after that first wave theem to have gunth now" When Esme spoke, it became quite clear that her arms weren't the only thing to be made of foreign material; as when she spoke people could spot that her tongue was a sleek metal colour. It didn't quite give her entirely the range of words that most people could - hence the slight lisp in her sentence - but she seemed to be glad just to have the ability to express herself in the first place. "Whath the plan?"

Dan seemed to hesitate in making the call for everyone to just keep proceeding without caring about the casualties, as he cared too much about the people there to say that. I couldn't blame him; there was the high chance that the enemy would fire upon us the moment we dared to even stick a toe out around that curve. So, I really supposed it was a stroke of luck that I had come along with them.

" _Dan, you can hang onto the side of the cabin and guide PJ around the curve. I can act as your bodyguard, as my Shephard's Cowl will make sure that I won't be hurt by bullets"_ I couldn't help but reach out with my hand to gently touch his hand, the two of us loosely intertwining our fingers as he listened to my plan. He needed the extra support right now, so that he could trust me to do my job correctly and come away safely. None of his members seemed to notice beyond Esme, but she simply giggled like it was adorable to see this side of her boss, before twirling around and joining her other team mates ahead. _"The others in your team can hang back. That way, if anyone gets past us we don't have to worry about them reaching the battlefield"_

My husband needed a split second to compose himself - taking in the feeling of my gloved hands in his - before he steeled his nerves. With as much confidence behind his voice as he could muster, he started to order the others so that I wouldn't have to talk.

"Alright everyone, you're staying here at this curve in the ravine! The team Hyena member and I will be going ahead with the truck from team K, so keep this place safe for us" Dan told them all this at the same time as waving PJ forward, my pack connection with the two boys telling me quite easily that he was telling the very same plan over to the latter waiting patiently inside the heavy vehicle.

"Will do sir, no Alpha will get past us" Hento used one of his long spider legs to salute his leader, it looking quite comically large against his much smaller frame. "Except for our pal in team Hyena, of course"

I somewhat sarcastically gave him a salute, appreciating that they were trying to keep each other’s spirits up despite the frenzied attitude that the majority of people seemed to carry on that day. With them acting as our guards of honour, I moved ahead while hearing the reassuring rumble of PJ's truck follow behind me.

I didn't dare give the enemy time to figure out what we were doing; immediately charging around the corner like I was trying to outrun some kind of rampaging Rakk Hive (I had done that today, so I supposed I could actually compare the two). It ended up getting the exact effect I was aiming for; with the Alpha directly around that corner being utterly startled, giving me enough time to rear back my arm and slam my fist directly into one of their jaws.

With that Alpha either being knocked unconscious or simply dying on the spot - honestly, I sincerely hoped it was the former so that he could get run over by PJ's wheels - I was able to snag his assault rifle from his hands before immediately turning it upon his allies still standing there slack-jawed. As the majority fell immediately once their heads popped open or got their throats torn out, some of them tried to fire back; with the bullets bouncing off like it had before.

Once my assault rifle uselessly clicked in my hands, I switched over to using it as a blunt object - flinging it directly into the head of one of the few enemies I had missed the first time around - before allowing my hands to wrap securely around my shock pistols. The thrum of the electricity only seemed to match my adrenaline and still endorphin high from the instant health vials, my feet pumping to a immense speed over the sands as my mind figured out a plan.

"Hento, Esme! Take the enemies out when I shock them!" I called that out loud enough for both team members to hear me correctly, my guns lowering long before I could hear them obediently coming out at my beck and call. With around eighteen Alpha lingering around before that narrowing of the ravine, I confidently was able to shoot twelve of them with one clip, before lifting my pistols upwards to remove the empty shells.

"Hyena buddy! Gimme a bootht!" Esme was polite enough to ask for it, and I quite happily obliged her by placing away my pistols and lifting my hands up high into the air. She launched herself into another flip like she had done before, before using my hands as a catching point. With her securely holding onto my hands, I quickly twirled around to build up speed before I flung her at the furthermost electrocuted Alpha. Like a special dancer, she managed to build up enough strength in her arms so that she could use their head as a springboard, bouncing over to the next head and repeating the process yet again.

Hento lingered just a little bit behind me, taking his long spindly legs to skewer the ones directly nearby me, allowing me enough time to slot in another lot of bullets into my pistols. With the final six Alpha seemingly staring in utter disbelief at the fact that I seemed to be invincible, that we had some giant metal spider and a violent blur on our side, it gave me six easy shots against them; with Esme bouncing between those six and finishing the problems that lay before us.

"Great job you guys!" Dan quickly praised those two before they quickly slunk back around the curve, Esme giving her boss a wide smile as she clung onto one of Hento's legs to speed up their movement back. Hento took the rare opportunity to give a thumbs up, but he too was gone before long. " _Full speed ahead PJ, those Alpha won't wait long"_

I decided to hitch a ride on the truck as PJ surged ahead, quickly climbing across the top so that I would be able to get away much faster. Dan seemed to be slowly climbing along the side just like I was, the two of us quickly seeing the sharp rocks on the side of the ravine enclosing on us. That wasn't the only thing that one of us saw however, as Dan and PJ's startled emotions filled in that something was going wrong.

" _Rocks!!"_ Despite the fact that I could understand what they were exactly saying, my mind couldn't quite catch onto what was happening. I assumed they meant that a rock seemed to be dropping from above us, so I hurriedly rolled over the truck roof so that I would be able to get off it without being crushed, but the truck tipping sharply to one side fixed that misconception very quickly.

The moment I was back on sandy ground I was able to turn around, seeing that the rocks had instead been flung by the Alpha; proven as much when I could see that one had been shoved directly into the front of the truck and the other had gone for the front left wheel. The first rock flattened the front of the truck against the seats inside - my mind being able to hear the frightened scream coming from PJ - and the latter one absolutely trashed the front left wheel; sending the truck tipping over onto its left... Right where Dan had been trying to crawl out of.

" _NO!!"_ My mind screeched out in fright as the truck finally tipped over onto it's side, the extremely loud crashing noise ringing out at exactly the same time as it sent dust flying in both the Alpha's and my direction. I didn't waste time waiting for the dust to clear, storming over despite my hazy vision, reaching out with my hands to feel the tipped diagonally placed truck. It had just barely gotten itself wedged into the narrowing of the ravine, which meant that I wouldn't be able to just pull the truck out to check on both members. _"Dan! PJ!"_

" _I'm alright!"_ PJ managed to answer my frightened call, but there was no verbal or mental response from Dan. Just as I worried that Dan had managed to die exactly like Tyler had so long ago, I managed to feel the heavy filters of pain coming from him and I was able to finally pick out that it wasn't coming from PJ; Dan likely falling unconscious from the truck collapsing onto him and the wall next to him. A second later I could hear the truck door make a loud _thump!_ before PJ's panic seemed to soar even higher than before. _"The... The door won't open though! The cabin crumpling in caused it to jam the door into the frame!"_

 _"But your teleporter is still working, right?!"_ I asked him frantically, my hands already curled around the side of the truck to lift it off my husband once PJ was out of the truck. The lack of response... Was not the sign I was hoping for. _"PJ, answer me!"_

_"...No. It isn't"_

Of course; the cabin likely had crumpled in such a manner that it had smashed the teleporter against the seats behind it. With the dust settling ever so slightly, I knew that I didn't have time to haul them both out before the Alpha arrived at the truck. Forget getting them both out, letting the Alpha get to the truck and use those explosives against us would be an even worse blow than not getting the ravine closed off like I had hoped.

Logically, I should have gone for PJ first. He was relatively uninjured compared to Dan, lifting the door out would be so much easier than lifting the entire truck up, he would be able to easily shift over to a new truck in team K and return to the fight like nothing had ever happened. Emotional decisions were never supposed to impact a leader's decisions... They shouldn't, because it would often be unfair to everyone else or possibly even lose the fight because of it.

_"...It's been an honour serving with you PJ"_

_"That it has Ally, that it has"_

...But damn it, I couldn't do it. With a protective surge washing over me, I hurriedly lifted the truck ever so slightly away from the wall until I could squeeze myself in there. Once the sun reached into that space, I could see quite clearly that the truck had shoved him against the rocky surface of the wall; covering his left side in bruises and even opened some portions of his skin, the blood trickling down his face and arms.

"I've got you" I broke my rule of not speaking out loud if I could help it, my hands carefully curling around his chest so that I could carefully lift him into my arms. With him tightly pressed against my chest, I did nothing more than shuffle my way out from that gap yet again. The very moment I was out of there, I was forced to shift him in my arms until he was laid across like a bride (lest his long legs drag over the ground, he was taller than me after all), and ran away to get him to safety.

PJ didn't wait long, stalling just long enough to let Dan and I storm around the curve in that ravine - Dan's team members of course being utterly surprised to see their boss with his extensive injuries - before the ravine behind us seemed to light up directly behind us. It was akin to a volcano setting off directly behind us, causing the ground to shake and filling our ears with the glorious _BOOM!_ to flood our ears. Even as we felt the entire ravine collapse into itself behind us, it felt... Like a million needles piercing my heart.

"What happened?!" Mickey asked me, coming forward and timidly holding his arm out to his team leader, before ultimately deciding to retract that arm. With their leader out of commission and their task completed, they did need orders, regardless of who they came from.

"Return to the battlefield until you get new orders; DL2 will be coming here to take over things" I didn't bother hiding my authoritative voice, and each and every one of them accepted it with a firm nod of their head; wanting to take orders even if it didn't make much sense that someone from Hyena was telling them what to do. With Dan's breath softly wafting onto my neck as a reminder of him still being alive, I wanted nothing more than to get him to Jade before anything else. "I'm going to bring your leader to team Ban. Until he comes back, Hento is in charge"

They took my orders like champs, and I wasn't going to wait any longer to take my leave. Turning around and giving DL2 a run for their money in terms of speed, I dashed across the sands back to where I remembered Jade to be.

"...Ally?" Almost as quiet as a church mouse, I could hear Dan mumble that into my neck as I ran my heart out. When I glanced down it was almost impossible to tell if he had murmured that in his unconscious state or whether he was just barely back enough to register my strong arms bundling him close to me, but it was enough to reassure me that he was going to be alright. Whether it was the right or wrong thing to do, I was _not_ going to lose him that day.

"You'll be alright Dan" I whispered softly back to him, softly kissing him on the right side of his forehead despite my mask somewhat keeping my lips separate from his skin. "I love you"

"...Mm"


	15. On Pandora; Hell Hath No Fury

Several eyes naturally gravitated towards me as I strode through our ranks, and it wasn't outlandish that they did so; someone darting in between them at an odd angle was strange enough without further context - but their attention certainly seemed to stay when they spotted the bloody man sprawled in my arms.

I truly wished in that moment that Jack had upgraded my teleporter to take two people so that I could have brought Dan straight to Jade like I had done for my own injury, but my mentor could only see negatives coming from such a design, first and foremost the possibility of an unwanted Alpha hitching a ride back with me by accident if I had to go to the front lines. As such, my time had to be spent in ferrying back my injured husband instead of other things.

It didn't take long for me to pinpoint Jade again - her blonde hair standing out of the miles of soldiers with dark blue clothing on - my mind already practically shouting for her to pay attention to me yet again like I was her fussy child. Like most people throwing a fit, I did end up capturing her momentary attention, with her picking out what had happened based on our pack link like she had done before.

" _How many times are you going to bring me injured people?"_ While she could tell that I wasn't really in the mood for it, she still attempted to fix my worried mood by cracking an internal joke about how I only came to visit her when I had gotten myself hurt. It missed more than it managed to hit within my mind, but at the very least I was able to calm myself by reminding myself that she was going to do everything within her power to take care of Dan without me there. " _Possible injuries?"_

 _"I'm unsure about broken bones and bruising, but he may have either of those. I'm more worried about his head than anything else, as he likely smacked it against the ravine wall when he got trapped under... A rock"_ Deciding that it was an improper time to tell her about PJ's death (it could only lead to her becoming quite upset in that moment), I hurriedly fixed my mental image and thoughts to replace the actual truck with an imaginary boulder that had been flung at Dan instead. It seemed to do the trick - Jade's mind reflecting the very same memory of a boulder being thrown despite that not being the case - so I was able to focus back on the task at hand. " _He has minor scrapes all down his left side because of the ravine wall, but those are likely to be minor to unimportant. He spoke momentarily to me on the way back, so I doubt he would have received that big of a blow, but-_

"Ally, Flight is reporting that the Alpha army has overtaken Opportunity. The full force of their troops are likely going to be relocated back to the battlecruiser, and then our way shortly after that" Chris interrupted my rambling thoughts, causing my mental communication with the medic to come to a screeching halt like a train that had been derailed. While grumbling under my breath about the poor timing of things, Jade only giggled softly; telling me that she wasn't worried at all.

 _"I've got him"_ She reassured me that she had things under control, using a gentle touch to my hand to further communicate that feeling of trust between us. We hadn't been in a pack for over twenty years for no reason after all; I would trust her with my life. As such, my husband's life didn't seem so much of a stretch. " _I'll take whatever problems I can off your mind so that you can focus on winning this, alright? Now go give them something to be afraid of"_

I took a split second to gently grasp her slender fingers in mine - an unspoken token of gratitude - before flicking open my cape in a flourish and reaching for another switch. Finding the one that belonged to Chris was easy, it was the furthest to my right, and off I went in another flash of light.

We had specifically coded the teleporter to take me to Chris' former station; kneeling away from sight into a small nook around the side of the rock outcropping. Spek and Mathilda didn't seem to notice my appearance despite the purple light coming from my device; their eyes were intently trained on their radios with their hands tightly pressed to one earpiece and another on the dial. The only person who did notice my approach was the more important one out of that trio, as Chris could clearly notice the difference between silence and my mind filtering words and images idly through it.

With a smile on his face (despite the fact he wasn't supposed to be showing any sign that anything had changed), he picked out his own special wind grenade in preparation for us to switch places once more. While his face looked like mine with the hologuise on, I could very easily imagine his original face behind the hood glancing back at me... But that illusion got broken the moment a bullet came hurtling past, spreading a shower of blood as it went straight through his head.

Mathilda couldn't help but let out a frightened shriek, as she naturally got covered in the largest amount of dark red liquid coming from Chris' location, with little bits of interspersed droplets splattering onto Spek and I. The hologuise kept trying to cloak his body in its corrective blue light despite the fact that he no longer truly had a need for it, his body collapsing onto the rock outcropping with a heavy _thud!,_ which caused his hand to release the wind grenade from his tight grip. It rolled just that bit closer to me, so I was able to give it an ever so gentle flick with my fingers, causing it to launching off the side of the rock outcropping like it was supposed to do in the first place.

The grenade exploded in a bunch of sand like I had hoped it would, shrouding the top of that rocky place before anyone could notice the problem on top of it. Taking the momentarily blinding amount of sand to my advantage, I scrambled back up to my perch on that rock as I removed my mask; making it seem like I hadn't left at all. I muttered a silent apology to Chris - and Phil for the unfortunate fact that he would have to handle his fellow friend's body just like I had - before rolling his body off the top of the rock outcropping to the sand below it.

"Ally! Are you alright?!" Spek happened to speak right over the quiet sound of Chris landing below us, her hands loosely waving through the sandy air as if to search for me. To stop her from possibly poking her head over too long and also getting fired upon, I softly touched the back of my hand in hers; feeling quite relieved when I saw her hand retract after that.

"Yes, I'm alright" I hid any outward signs that I was affected by the death of my comrade, as much as I wanted to wreak havoc upon the enemy for it. With the last bit of obscuring sand I took a small dollop of blood that had landed on me before smearing it along one of my cheeks, pretending that was what had caused the veritable shower over my receivers. "I turned my face away from the enemy and they managed to strike my cheek"

"Are you sure? I thought I saw you collapse!" Mathilda cried out in worry, the poor girl trying to wipe away the blood so that she would be able to both see and touch things without getting the red tint on everything around her.

"I did hit the deck in case another bullet was following the first one" I put a lot of authoritative tone in that sentence, wanting them to skip past it the moment they were able to. As much as I could sympathise with Mathilda and Spek possibly just seeing what would have been considered a death, there were going to be far more deaths if we wallowed in misery the whole time. "Status report on the teams and current Alpha location"

"I, uh... Team Cy is returning from the North-West ravine at the same time as DL2 are going towards it. We have zero response from the leader of team K, so it is presumed that he died in collapsing the ravine; his second in command Memphis has taken over and they are waiting on standby for bombing runs against any advancing waves" Spek took a moment to gather her thoughts after the previous incident, but the moment she had her mojo back it was exactly like she had never gotten distracted in the first place. I had gotten these two girls for my communication team for a good reason. "Flight is circling overhead but not engaging any enemy troops because they all seem to have weapons on them now, and Ban is beginning to patch up a spare few injured members from Spar. K2 is waiting on standby, but the leader of that team reports that she has gotten her invisibility cloak to work for much longer due to some minor tweaking"

"They are getting over the shields?" I asked them, slightly concerned with hearing such a revelation.

"Only momentarily, but the force of them landing on some Spar members shoulders is causing some problems. They're worried that if they tilt their shields slightly to prevent that from happening that the Alpha will use the shields as springboards to get much further into the thick of our army" Mathilda explained that part of things, gently waving her hands to drip some of the excess blood off herself. Part of me wondered when she was going to realise that the amount of blood on her was far too much for a simple cheek graze, but at the same time I was grateful that she wasn't questioning it just yet. "Arc hasn't gotten much to do because of the enemies holding back right now, and Snip has reported that their supply of bullets is still holding steady. Hyena is bored but otherwise has no real problems, and Hermes has returned to their normal rounds now that the interference is no longer affecting communication lines"

"Hydra?" The planetary cannon would end up dealing with the rest of the enemy hiding in the battlecruiser, but it likely wouldn't be so easy to just shoot them with the massive gun yet again.

"Paulo said that the cannon is nearly ready to fire again, but they haven't ever targeted something directly on the planet's surface before" Mathilda already had that lined up, craning her head up a little bit to peer around me. She luckily ducked her head back before any of the enemy could shoot at her - or conversely have me yell a her for putting herself needlessly in danger. "They would have to guess where through the mountain they would have to fire, and they worry that they would miss too easily without something exact to target"

I glanced in the direction that she had indicated, seeing that there indeed was a massive mountain that would block their view to the battlecruiser. Keeping the landscape exactly the same wasn't the main problem in my mind, but I could certainly see why they wouldn't be so keen on firing randomly until they got lucky. But an earlier remark about one of the teams did give me something to think about, glancing through my spyglass at the waiting horde of enemies that had returned from their excursion at the city of Opportunity.

"Instruct the leader of K2 to prepare a special tracker for the planetary cannon, and place it along with several remote detonation bombs around the main hull of the enemy ship. Make sure that she uses the invisibility cloak that she mentioned to avoid detection for as long as possible, and I want Hydra to fire upon the tracker's location the moment it is available for them to do so" Spek immediately got to work the moment I gave that set of instructions, chattering away into her radio to give orders to both teams that I had mentioned. But while I expected that to go over much easier, the following words I expected to get far more of a reaction out of them. "Once they have their orders, tell all teams except for DL2, Hermes and Ban to advance forward to strike the enemy"

It did get a far greater reaction; with both of my attentive girls to halt momentarily and stare at me in bewilderment.

"...Advancing?" Spek was confused, as that had never been involved in any of the planning we had done in the past for this fight. While yes, staying put and waiting for the Alpha to come to us first was always the part discussed, part of waging war meant switching tactics if things weren't going to go well. "Does that also mean the three of us?"

"Not Chris, he's staying behind to coordinate things with team Hermes and team Ban. But those fuckers are going to learn what happens when they actually face people who won't take their bullshit lying down" I came up with an excuse as to why Chris wouldn't be noticed joining me (honestly, it was a wonder they hadn't noticed his silence this whole time), gesturing with a confident hand for the two girls to collect their radios and stand up. "You'll both be safe behind me; the Shephard's Cowl won't let a single bullet get through to you both"

Although still quite nervous with the prospect, they obediently packed up their radios after announcing the newest order, stepping up to allow me to take them both in my arms. Keeping them tight against my chest, we safely jumped down to the very same sand... And I was quite relieved to see that Phil had taken measures to cover Chris with a sand camouflaged sheet.

"I'm sorry for getting blood on you Ally" Mathilda quickly apologised the moment I released her, as though she thought it was exceedingly rude to cover her leader in that crimson liquid. If she had done it on purpose, then I could understand her apologies, but this was not her fault.

"It's fine; it's not the first time I've been covered head to toe in blood" I tried to make a joke with her, only realising after a couple of seconds from her confused glance that she hadn't been around long enough to hear exploits of the Vault trials or seen the special educational video that Jack had made of my journey twenty years ago. "...Actually, never mind. Forget you heard that"

"Chin up Thilda, I think she's trying to cheer you up" Spek gave her teammate a soft jab in the shoulder, which seemed to do the trick in place of my words. Phil threw a tiny protective shield over her head, which I caught; it would help prevent an actual cheek graze or bullet to my face when the hood was pulled back for any reason.

I wasn't exactly pleased to see that the troops hadn't moved forward despite my command, instead there seemed to be a heavy murmur running through the ranks; a sense of unease that prevented them from moving forward. If they didn't move forward themselves there was the chance that I would have to lead in the literal sense, but a single member at the very front of the army held up their hand in a tightly clenched fist. That fist seemed to silence the murmur spilling around their ears, which allowed them to hear the victorious shout of that one soldier.

"Death to tyrants!" Despite being stationed so far from us, we could hear his cry loud and clear. It was a voice filled with rage, holding that feeling of injustice and torment that everyone there had either faced or seen with their own eyes take place. With one cry, he reminded everyone there what we were fighting for.

"Who... Who is that?" Mathilda asked me softly, hiding behind me just like I had asked her to do. Pulling my spyglass out to peer into the distance... I couldn't have been more proud to recognise the back of their head across those sandy skies.

"It's Mark" My voice clearly portrayed just how proud of him I was, especially so when that very same chant of his seemed to spread around him in a tidal wave to the people around him. He may have been born an Omega, but in another time I could easily see him as some kind of person to lead the charge on injustice even if I weren't there. "The son of a bitch is doing amazing"

 **"Death to tyrants! Death to tyrants!"** That chant soon became an entire war cry for our entire army, and I didn't even have to command them to move forward; as they all moved forward in tandem with their own speech. I found myself swept into the chanting as well, my strong voice carrying much further as an amplified version of Mark's, soon becoming almost unbearably loud in our ears as we stormed ahead.

My eyes could spot a slight shimmer moving through our ranks at one point, taking advantage of the ensuing chaos of our moving army and the subsequent startled reaction of the distant Alpha to their advantage; Kyanna perfectly tiptoeing around anyone and everyone she needed to in order to bring the confounded enemy ship down. She still was quite the distance away from the hull of the battlecruiser however, so she likely would need extra assistance in drawing attention away from her.

"Inform team K that they should find gaps in our troops to start off the fight, and give a hint to Hyena to pick up any stray Alpha bodies that they find lying around; those can be used either as impromptu meat shields, projectiles or a barricade if need be" With my mind ticking away at what felt like a million miles an hour, I kept bringing up things that got brought into my mind now that I was back in charge. Chris did an admirable job to keep most of the busywork away from me while I was patching up the occasional hole in our forces, but it meant that I now had to switch right back to doing it myself without his help... Likely permanently, if I ever were to lead another war. "Ensure Snip has advanced far enough for them to be useful, but make sure that they do not end up getting in the way of Arc's targets. Arc should be aiming for troops further away from us - the explosions will be bad for team Spar"

"Yes ma'am" Spek received those orders loud and clear, her and Mathilda shifting their radio backpacks around enough that they could use them just as effectively as they could while we were on the rock outcropping. Basically, our position had only shifted slightly closer to the front lines, but not much else.

It didn't take long for the first truck to come rumbling past, finding a spot right between myself and a clustered group of Hyena to my right. The person driving the truck seemed to give the horn a slight _honk_ as he came whizzing by, clearly recognising me now that I was no longer wearing my mask; my literal presence seeming to raise the spirits of everyone around me by sheer confidence in my abilities. With all of the other trucks coming rumbling through our ranks, I waited just a bit for the first one to reach the Alpha - who still seemed to be unsure of what to make from our army of forty billion coming to them rather than hiding from them - before using my voice as the starting gun for the last fight.

"DEATH TO TYRANTS!!" I screamed that at the top of my lungs, and my words only seemed to be accentuated by the heavy punch of the first truck exploding with a heavy _boom!_ at the front of the enemy forces.

The ensuing waves of scattering limbs, gore and blood ended up being a literal shower of bloody mist across the sand, but that didn't deter any of my troops marching towards the front lines. If anything, some of the people at the very front - definitely those within Hyena at least - seemed to revel in it. It certainly meant that Mathilda wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb anymore.

After the trucks had finished their first wave and gotten their drivers safely teleported back to the different waiting transports back at the sandy battlefield, it got proven without a doubt that these Alpha were not expecting resistance of our magnitude. Forget coming to meet us at the entrance of that ravine (whether it be because of their love of fights or out of sheer retaliation from their comrades getting decimated by our explosive trucks), the enemy turned tail and looked like they were going to run right back out of the ravine towards Opportunity; proving that they were just as much cowards as I had expected them to be the moment I heard of their attempts to prove their superiority over others in our solar system.

"Do we have a possibility of shutting down the other end of that ravine?" I asked the two girls huddling behind me, and almost instantly I could make out the sounds of them whispering incessantly into their radios to get a possible answer to my request.

"Kyanna says that she noticed that possibility happening. She already set up the tracker on the side of the battlecruiser and is hurrying over to the other side of the ravine" Mathilda spoke up before long, and I could hear the tell-tale signs of someone whispering through her radio to her. The battlefield was likely loud enough that my pack member could get away with the quiet chattering, but she was wise enough to not push her luck in terms of shouting through her own receiver. "In fact, she says that-

Mathilda had the slight misfortune of being interrupted by the next explosion being set off, and it was quite obvious which one this set belonged to when the sound of tumbling rocks followed right after it. With my spyglass raised to my eye yet again, I got a nice view of the other side of the ravine, the avalanche of debris tumbling down onto some of the Alpha who had gotten closer to that entrance than their comrades had. There were a spare few that had managed to make it out, but it seemed to be a small amount; no larger than some of the rowdier bandit groups that could sparsely be found around the wastes of Pandora. The hardy survivors of this world would make short work of them.

Kyanna cutting off their escape route ended up making the majority of Alpha trapped between our army and the new barrier preventing them from leaving. Some truly desperate enemies ended up trying to slowly climb up over the rocks blocking their exit - and some others ducked down towards the North into the other closed off area where DL2 would shortly handle them - but it was clear that the majority decided to revert back to their basic instinct; akin to being a cornered animal while we encroached upon them.

It became absolute chaos where the front lines met the enemy, with such an amount of bullets, Alpha bodies and movement going on that it was near impossible for me to tell friend from foe so far back from those lines. I could just barely make out the hexagonal shields of team Spar, but that seemed to be the best I could make out. It likely was going end up in an absolute blood bath, but I still held fast to the desire that we wouldn't have too many casualties on our side.

"Hydra is reporting that their console is picking up the tracking device" Mathilda was excited to report that, but I found myself only half listening as my hands reached for my shock pistols; the enemy was coming closer to our marching position. "They do want to wait until Kyanna is away before they rise up and fire however; as they are certain that she would be caught in the crossfire if they were to do it now"

If it had been just some random person out of the forty billion army, I would have given the order to completely disregard the person planting the bombs and fire already; dealing a massive blow was a steal in exchange for one measly life. But I held off for a couple of seconds, carefully sweeping the distance with my spyglass to see if I could spot her illusive shimmer in between the scrambling enemy.

Something else happened near the front lines which completely captured my focus instead, my eyes naturally drawn to what seemed to be one of team Spar being dragged out from the front lines by an Alpha that got too close. It didn't take long for my eyes to pick out that it happened to be the very same team member that had rallied our army - Mark - who was being helplessly drug across the sand by one of his feet, despite his best efforts to smack the Alpha's hands away with the side of his shield.

A member of Hyena that had been closely sticking around him leapt right into the ray to help him the moment they saw that he was in trouble, and wouldn't you know it; it was my old mentor Jack. The notion of him jumping to Mark's rescue would have been an absolute joke when the both of them first met each other (I'm quite certain they tried to kill each other a couple of times), but it was clear to everyone that Jack would not idly stand by and let his fellow pack member die without a hefty fight on someone's hands.

Curling his left hand into a claw form, Jack quickly tunnelled his fingers into the opposing Alpha's right eye, which caused that enemy to howl in pain and release Mark immediately and reach up for their injured face instead. With the opening still in his favour, Jack found it effortless to thrust his right arm back and heave it right into the distracted enemy's face, their head shattering like porcelain under the assault.

With Mark regaining his footing a moment later, he brought back up his shield in a defensive position as he started to walk backwards to fit back in line with his team yet again, but paused for a brief moment when he noticed that Jack was not following him. He shouted at the Alpha - undoubtedly telling the other to hurry up and re-join the lines alongside him - but the older man dismissed him with a distracted wave of the hand; he was too much in the thick of the fight to be able to sneak back without pulling his opponents to the front lines.

Not that far away from that commotion, I finally managed to find the shimmer that I recognised from Kyanna's cloaking device. She too had been distracted by our fellow pack member nearly being torn asunder, wandering a little closer in case there was something she could do while she was still hidden from prying eyes. Unfortunately, one of the Alpha storming past her seemed to bump into one part of her (her shoulder, likely), causing the shimmering of her cloak to instead glitch incessantly because of the harsh contact.

That contact seemed to be far too much for it, her invisibility cloak soon running out of energy; revealing herself in the midst of the enemy. The Alpha who had bumped into her naturally looked backwards to see what he had contacted against, and had the very first view of her decked out in the heavy cloak and numerous amounts of heavy explosives. But if she was one thing, she was exceedingly proud of herself; there was little to no chance that she was going to let herself be rescued by sacrificing several others. Instead, she reached for the nearest detonation switch that she could find, angrily spitting harsh words in those Alpha's faces before pressing down on the bright red button.

"Choke on it, you son of a-

Exactly like her husband, she went up in a fiery explosion. While concerned for what their young daughter was going to do without either of them to take care of her, we had far better chances of winning because of both of them.

"Order Hydra to rise immediately and fire upon the tracker's location" I gave those orders to Mathilda, slightly tilting my head backwards to glance at the top of her head. With myself being slightly distracted I felt what was likely a bullet being fired at me, it harmlessly bouncing off my shoulder. For some reason that shot irritated me heavily... If Chris had been hit by that instead of the headshot, then he would have likely survived quite easily. Simply the poor luck of it all combined with my anger created quite the volatile reaction in my mind, it likely showing in my furious eyes. "...And for good measure, I want you to contact Helios again. Tell him that he needs to decimate their remains, else he'll never get my support ever again"

"Er, actually, he reported to me a couple of minutes ago that he was holding back for some reason" Spek already had an answer for that second request, even if it turned out to be not the one I had wanted to hear. As my head tilted around just a bit so that I could see her instead, I could just barely spy her eyes scanning the skies above us, before softly pointing with her finger to indicate that she had spotted something that I likely would need to see myself. "I'm guessing it is for that"

Following her finger, I soon saw a beautiful show of a million colours dipping out of the sky. It took my mind a couple more seconds to fully register that the colours weren't a trick of the eye, but a swarm of endless ships coming out of orbit of our planet. I had never been one for pretty colours all swirling together, but in that moment the millions of different shades upon them was utterly beautiful. If there had been any doubt as to whose side they were on, then the massive Helicarrier following behind them was a clear signal; they were there for _us._

 _"_ All units, provide support for the ground troops of Pandora!" Mila's voice came ringing through Spek's radio in such a volume that I didn't even need to hold it near my ear, and the following cheer of her followers proved that her enthusiasm was a common thing not just for her but for all of her people. With a cheeky grin crossing my lips, I gestured for Spek to hand me the receiver so that I could speak to the fellow leader.

"Just make sure you don't get caught in the beam coming from the planetary cannon; I'd hate to have to put on your tombstone that you were too eager" I felt completely comfortable poking fun at her, and it was clear from the soft giggle coming back that she was more than prepared to do the same back to me.

"Can't be any worse than having 'refused to ask for help' on yours"

"True, that would be exceedingly embarrassing"

I was more than happy to have our ribbing cut short by the heavy _WHUM!_ of the planetary cannon, the shockwave of it even causing my hair to shudder a little underneath my hood as though every part of me was able to be excited by it. The mountain standing in the way of the beam didn't remain whole for long, soon sporting a giant hole once the beam tore through it - but the beam didn't dare stop until it reached the battlecruiser stranded in the ravine, making the entire construct explode brilliantly.

Whatever didn't get decimated in the explosion started to fall and crush any of the Alpha who dared to stand beneath it, and I didn't feel that they would last long once Mila and her horde of fighters joined in; their lasers and missiles sweeping securely over the rest of the area before the little bastards could escape. With a heavy sigh - finally understanding some of Jack's old habits of wanting to slump his shoulders after a long day at work - things finally felt like they were coming to a close.


	16. After the War; Taking Stock

Soaring down out of space into the skies above Pandora felt quite exhilarating, even though it paled in comparison to the moment my forces had won over the three space battlecruisers. The fighters still following behind me didn't even have to do the majority of the work, as Ally seemed to control some gigantic cannon on the planet’s surface, destroying the final battlecruiser with ease. In the end, the only remaining task left to us from the P.W.C. was to mop up the other fighters that remained after the destruction of their downed fortress.

"Total number of Alpha still registered by our scanners is less than a hundred ma'am" I was never more pleased to hear that announcement coming over the Banshee's communicators, and it felt like I could finally release the controls of the Banshee out of the white knuckled grip I held them in. "And the majority of those are within the clutches of our allies down on Pandora"

"Thank you CJ" My lungs felt like they were deflating with how heavy I sighed, but that didn't seem to carry over the communicators by the lack of feedback coming from the machine. My attention quickly turned to Paul in the seat beside me, his mind still flitting in between a conscious and unconscious state from the searing pain in his leg. "Send a squad of medics down to Pandora to assist the ground troops with triage please; I'll be heading down myself to check in with Ally"

"Of course Mila" CJ left me with nothing more than that, leaving me to accomplish whatever I had originally set out to do.

While completely unnecessary, I was relieved to spot familiar ships still following closely in my wake; Malaki, Jfred, Bobby, Connor and Marvin still remaining in a tight formation in the remote case that I would still need them somehow. With the ground troops mostly near the ravine instead of their original location, there was plenty of space for our ships to land anywhere we pleased on the battleground.

The door at the back of my Banshee opening to that planet was akin to someone opening the door to an oven; an intense heat wave that I couldn't help but initially shield my face from. Paul didn't mind it nearly as much - him releasing a soft sigh in the seat next to mine - and I could only imagine that it was because of the heat relaxing his tired body.

Leaving my ship felt like a difficult task with the increased temperature, but the view was absolutely brilliant. Without the masses of troops under Ally's command, we had a grand view to the sun steadily setting over the sands and rocky mountains. That very same sand felt a little strange under my platform heels... So I finally let myself go for a brief moment, taking those heels off to let my socked feet sink into the soft texture. It was a heavenly combination, the heat and gentle caresses acting like a massage on my tired body; like taking a vacation after a lifetime of work.

"It's been years since I felt this heatwave" Jfred chuckled, looking like he was handling the heat far better than any of the rest were doing. Connor was already sweating a bit much, hiding behind the impressive shadow that Malaki was able to cast, and Bobby looked like he seriously was considering joining his comrade behind the tall Alpha. Marvin was fetching out a handkerchief, even offering a second one in case I thought that I would need it. "How's Paul doing?"

"Still resting in the co-pilots seat, and I can't blame him at all" I worriedly glanced back at my partner, who hadn't even stirred when his name had been called. Proper procedure meant that I had to ensure that nothing more had to be done before I went back to him however, so I turned to the very same Alpha to have someone with him until the medics arrived.

Jfred immediately understood; clasping his hand tightly onto my shoulder and giving it a squeeze to emphasize that he would be more than willing to do as I asked. Unlike usual, his grasp was incredibly painful due to his Alpha strength coming to the fore... But there was no doubt in my mind that he meant it as a compliment; that he no longer believed that I had to be treated with such a delicate nature lest he break something.

"Malaki, stay with Connor, Marvin and Bobby. I don't want to risk the chance that some of the troops here on the surface might mistake you for an enemy" I found myself growing quite upset when I realised that there were not many people left in my pack to give orders to, only a spare few standing around after Jfred went into the Banshee. "If it is possible, I would like the four of you to inspect the wreckage of the battlecruiser that managed to make it to the planet's surface. I imagine they would be eager to get rid of it before it becomes an eyesore"

"I'm not exactly sure, some Alpha might want to keep it as a trophy" Malaki chuckled, as he knew quite well how some Alpha would see the wreckage as. He was still their class type, even if he was leagues away from being as horrific as the men who dared attack that solar day. Marvin however, he rolled his eyes, as he couldn't see the point in leaving behind the materials when they could be reused to save other people's lives.

"We'll get right on it Mila" Bobby assured me, standing just that little bit taller as though he was trying to come to attention in a military style. He had been slumping for quite a bit considering what had happened to Sera, but he wasn't going to give up on the rest of us.

With those four trudging off to do as I had instructed them, it fell to me to find exactly where Ally had gotten off to. I supposed that it could have been child's play to contact her via communicator or radio to ask her to come towards me, but she was likely just as sick of moving to every single corner of the battlefield... Besides, my feet were still enjoying their dip in the sand; so walking to her would do me good.

Bringing a hand up to shield my eyes from the setting sun (it seemed to be larger here than it was on Alfu, which made sense considering it was closer to it in our solar system), I peered at the myriad of people that I could see in the distance. Contrary to what I had expected, I was able to make a reasonable guess as to where Ally had scarpered off to; she likely was the person walking around in the blood soaked cloak near that tall rock pillar. She was joined by two younger girls - one of which was also covered in blood - and a taller man leaning over what seemed to be a tarpaulin laid over some over object.

It felt blissful to have all the time in the world to just saunter my way over to the lot of them, and before long Ally seemed to recognise me from behind her hood. She removed it as a sign of respect towards me; giving a sharp nod that I felt I had to return out of a sense of comradery.

"Mila" She said my name with such authority that there was no doubt that she had to be Ally, her tone and posture practically radiating a strong leadership quality that others couldn't replicate. It appeared that she was still in what I affectionately referred to as her 'battle mode'; no-nonsense to the extreme and not a trace of a smile anywhere near her face. "We kicked some real ass with your movement on our side"

"I can only hope that we managed to prevent many deaths" I shared what I considered to be a typical sentiment, my eyes sweeping over her jubilant victorious troops in the distance. "Did you have many casualties?"

"Only a billion, so frankly we got away with acceptable losses" Despite the casual way she remarked on that, I couldn't help but wince at her dismissive tone. To me, a billion was far too great a loss... But then again, she commanded an army of forty billion from a bunch of different planets, while we faced off against the majority of the Alpha army with only sixty million to mine and Matthias' name. "You?"

"Around ten million; far too many" I admitted the amount we had lost within space, and she nodded her head respectfully. My numbers couldn't even compare to hers, but she wasn't completely heartless in disregarding that it meant much more to me. "...As well as some personal losses in my own pack"

That seemed to be the final straw that smacked her out of her battle mode, her face shifting from the stoic impenetrable leader to a far softer and somber appearance. It appeared that I wasn't the only one to lose people close to myself, and her sweeping gaze to the nearby tarpaulin was an indicator as to why she and her communicators were there in the first place. Her two girls were softly kneeling in the sand next to their comrade, one crying softly while the other did their best to support her... And the man standing by looked like he had managed to age forty years within a single day.

"My pack as well" Ally admitted quietly, finally allowing herself the privacy to deal with their losses. "Jesse, Lissa, Chris, PJ, Kyanna... And my mentor"

I had heard vague stories from Matthias about her mentor, back from a time when he had gone by a different name entirely. The two of them - Ally and he - were incredibly close, so much so that if Ally had not met her husband then the two of them likely would have been a couple.

"My sincerest condolences" I reached out with my hand to gently clasp her hand in mine, the two of us doing our best to empathise with each other over our mutual losses. Her hands were incredibly rough, telling vast stories of all the hard work she had done on that harsh planet for what others would consider to be very little reward, and I could only hope that she understood that there truly was something she got for all of this; a beautiful future for others to enjoy. "I have no doubt in my mind that they are all proud of you"

She graced me with a soft smile, it being combined with the tears within her eyes slowly starting to gather together. My words weren't the only things to give her something to be happy about however, as I could spy someone approaching from behind her; and the startled look on her face seemed to say that she either knew the person limping to her or the person helping that man to stand... Maybe even both.

The man had curly brown hair, but the most distracting feature no doubt had to come from his right eye; which was a bright unnatural red colour. The woman beside him had the same long hair that Ally seemed to sport, but her eyes were a shade of green rather than the steely blue that belonged to her leader.

"Dan" Ally gently gave my hand a tap, and I released my hands from hers so that she was able to go see the man limping towards her. He seemed to be covered quite a lot in bruises around his body, but was making his way over to her the moment he had recovered just enough to see her. "I'm so glad to see that you're alright"

"I'm honestly surprised to see that the fighting has all been sorted while I was out" Dan couldn't help but lightly chuckle at how much Ally had gotten done the moment he was off the battlefield, and I could easily surmise that he was going to make a joke about how he wasn't needed after all... But perhaps it was the wrong time for that, as Ally delicately wrapped his taller limbs in a soft embrace. "We should let the people in the bunkers out now"

"I imagine that they would have gone stir crazy by now" The blonde girl with green eyes agreed with him, her looking as pleased as could be that she would be there to greet people exiting their aforementioned bunker. And who knew, it may have had something to do with the fact that she had someone waiting below ground for her.

"If I may" It was right then that I decided to interrupt, as I was unsure of when there was going to be a better opportunity presented to me. "May I accompany you all there? I know I am not expecting any familiar faces there, but I feel that I should be there to represent my people"

"Feel free" Ally granted me that request, a tender smile on her face as she allowed a grin to grow on her face. With a flourish of her cape, she began to wonder off from that location towards her budding town. While I would have felt far more comfortable lingering a little behind her, I forced myself to speed up until we were walking side by side; as leaders of this massive war we had quelled. "Spek, please contact my pack members and have them meet me by the bunker in Hope"

"Yes ma'am"

* * *

The journey back to hope was the same as it had always been, but it seemed to contain more wonder than I had ever remembered it being. Simple things like the sands taking on the golden glow of the sunset, to the little skittering creatures that came out when the heat left us for the cold night. I had fully accepted that I likely wouldn't live to see that day, so everything felt so incredible now that I had survived.

"Ally, I think we might want to slow down just a little" Mila softly asked me that, her petite hands grasping one of my sleeves to fully catch my attention. Her brown eyes were looking backwards, at Dan and Jade who was supporting the former with his injuries. Dan soon realised why we had paused, smiling at the same time that he shook his head.

"Don't slow down on my account" He promised me that he was fine, that he and Jade would take their time to get there even if it meant they were several minutes behind us. I trusted him on that, giving him a tender smile before moving onward.

The town of Hope seemed deserted when we arrived, as everyone who had not decided to join our fighting army was safely underground should the worst result have come true. But those empty streets would soon be filled once again, I just knew it. The trek up the cliff felt incredibly short, my hands already feeling excited to press on the button to call the people underneath the surface.

"Ah, looks like your other friends have arrived" Mila noticed the others coming up the cliff right behind us, and it didn't take long to spot the fact that Dan and Jade were right behind. I was surprised to see that Joy was included with everyone else within my pack, as I could have easily imagined that she would stubbornly stay by her husband’s side until the very last moment.

 _"As much as I hate to admit it, there is nothing more that I can do for him right now"_ Joy could read my mind to tell what I was thinking, her already explaining herself long before the words could form on my tongue. She looked like she hadn't seen much damage in the fight - some spare bits of hair seemed to be singed from a stray plasma shot - and her mind told me that she would have rather been in the thick of it, if it even had the slightest chance of altering what had happened to Chris. " _Kent will need me more"_

Anyone else who turned up with a deceased partner seemed to feel the same thing, that their children would need their support to get past the terrible news. Ninja Brian didn't have any particular lover like everyone else, but he too showed up; likely in support for the only child who was unfortunate enough to lose both of their parents.

"...Alright" I spoke aloud rather than thinking that phrase, as Mila no doubt was unable to hear any of it. She still stood by with a patient smile on her face, to act as a sign of hope for anyone else that would need that support to come back into the daylight. My hand reached for the console next to the firmly secured bunker doors, pressing the button firmly to call for someone to register that everything was alright. "This is Allison Forrey, calling for bunker twelve to return to the surface"

There was a period of silence that greeted me in return, as of course people wouldn't be hovering by their special console underground. But long before we could worry about something having happened to them, I heard a voice call through the console that was familiar in every single way.

"Sorry Mum, I happened to be cleaning my hearing aids right when you called. Sam had to tap me on the shoulder to get me over here" Michael was the one to answer the call, which was the procedure if my voice or Dan's was the one to get them out. My heart sang with happiness to hear his voice again, the three months keeping us apart feeling far too long. "Thank goodness you're still there. I'd recognise your voice anywhere, but I still have to do the mandatory three steps to ensure you aren't being held under duress or that someone is imitating your voice"

"Naturally" I was proud as punch to hear that he wasn't going to let me waltz in just like that; taking care of proper business just like I had raised him to. "Hit me"

He snickered on the other side of the console, finding that my particular choice of words to be exactly something that would come right from my lips. Dan too was internally beaming, and that feeling was steadily washing over the others within my pack. Mila too, as she smiled demurely behind her hand at how well I got along with my son.

"First step; ensuring that your voice is not simply being replicated by a machine" Michael recited something from a piece of paper that he had made for himself, as I could hear the crinkling of the paper as he held it up to his eyes. "Repeat this random phrase without stuttering or pausing: 'The blue fox ducks swiftly into the snowy den'"

"The blue fox ducks swiftly into the snowy den" It certainly wasn't something normal - our planet had some sparse bits of snow, but that was overshadowed by the massive stretches of desert - and it sounded like something that he would come up with; a brilliant picture appearing in my mind as I recited it back to him.

"Step two; making sure that you aren't being threatened by any Alpha" It seemed to be that I cleared the first task easily, as he went right next to the next one. I was frankly a little insulted that this task was even necessary in the first place, but I played along simply because I knew it was a last resort to keep the Alpha away from them.

"I'd sooner smash an entire battlecruiser over my own head"

A loud snort joined me shortly afterwards, Danny trying his best to keep quiet for my tasks but ultimately failing. Mark ended up punching in the shoulder for me, but it was clear that it was at least a humorous answer if nothing else.

"And step number three; ensuring that you aren't someone trying to replicate you" Michael felt comfortable in accepting my previous answer, giving me what was undoubtedly the strictest of them all. "Tell me something about yourself that nobody else could know"

Ah, of course. That eliminated anything from my educational journey twenty years prior, as people could have easily just picked something from that. While there was an entire list that I could have used, there was a special one in my mind that appeared the moment he asked me.

"If you had been born as a girl, your name would have been Angel" I admitted that to the console, a fact that very few people would be able to recite. The only other people in the solar system - the universe even - who could confirm that I was telling the truth was Dan, and Michael himself. It had been a special little titbit that I told my son on his thirteenth birthday, after he had seen a picture of Jack's young daughter in an old picture frame.

"...You really won?" Michael begged to know the truth, sounding like he was close to tears in knowing that he was able to live his life as he saw fit, at the very least with his mother at his side.

"I sure did kiddo"

A bunch of other young teenagers in the bunker loudly let out cheers at that announcement over the console, before someone shushed them quietly. They technically weren't supposed to let the enemy know how many of them there were, but now that it had been confirmed that there was no more enemies to be found, I didn't see any particular harm in it.

 **"Warning; bunker is raising main transportation platform to the surface. Please keep all limbs contained in the parameters, and do not crowd the doors"** The bunker's lights and warning signals started to set off once Michael authorised the go ahead, the people of Hope returning to the light of day. Not only that, but once one bunker was brought up it sent a signal to all of the others located all over Pandora, so that people no longer had to wait to hear the good news.

Dan peeled himself free of Jade, bringing himself forward until he was resting at my side. We wanted to be there for our son, and I couldn't resist the chance to gently kiss his temple.

The sound of the transportation platform was loud enough to be perfectly audible to everyone outside of the bunker, and it was like music to our ears. But far better than that, was the sheer fact that when the doors opened... We were flooded with the familiar faces that we all knew and loved.

"Mum! Dad!" Michael looked exactly the same as I had always remembered him; with my bright blue eyes and straight hair, and the deep dark brown colour that belonged to Dan.

Opening our arms so that he was able to charge directly into the middle of us, Michael was soon securely surrounded by our arms. Dan's left arm still moved a little slow around him, but it felt exactly the same to our son.

Off to our left I soon could spot Sam - One of Michael's close friends - run out and leap into his father’s arms. Sean laughed heartily as he wobbled under the sudden weight, but I had a feeling that it wasn't so strange considering Jade did the same back before their son had been born. He truly looked like his mother because of his short blonde hair and green eyes, but he contained the energy of both parents.

Sadly, that seemed to be where the happy reunions ended. Every other child from our pack had either lost one parent, or both in the extremely unlucky case for Kyanna and PJ's daughter.

The twin daughters of Lissa and Phil soon came out in search for both of their parents, and quickly found Phil waiting in the wings for them both. The younger daughter - Sarah - didn't seem to need anything else, quickly running to him and throwing her arms as much as she could around his impossibly tall shoulders, their hair looking one and the same; as dark brown as could be. Phil soon apologised for messing up her glasses, but she didn't care.

Jenny stayed back longer, searching everywhere to try and find where her mother was because she figured that her mum deserved to have a hug just as much as her father did. But no matter how hard she looked - even daring to peek around Mila to see if her mother was hiding behind the Omega's petite form - she couldn't find Lissa anywhere. It was when she turned her eyes back to her father that she saw how devastated he was... And understood why he was the only one to collect them from the bunker. After gently shifting his youngest child a little bit in his arms, he left the other wide open for Jenny, which the oldest gladly took.

Kent seemed to catch on a little faster - his father's eyes showing quite clearly from underneath his brown bangs - than some of his other friends might, as he understood that if one parent wasn't present at the bunker that it wasn't for some silly reason that they were far too busy. As such, it seemed to hit him extremely hard when he could only see Joy present in front of those doors, as it meant that his father hadn't survived.

"Hey champ" Joy greeted her son, but it seemed difficult for Kent to form any sort of response. As far as I had seen in their family dynamic, Joy had been pretty hands off in raising Kent while Chris was far more hands on, and this had inadvertently made a small amount of bias in Kent's mind on who he wanted to survive. Not that he didn't love his mother mind you, but... He certainly had a special place within his heart for his dad. "You look disappointed to see me"

"No, it's just..." Kent tried his best to fix that possible misconception, but he didn't seem to find the words to properly express how he felt. Thankfully, Joy was a good parent, so she knew what people meant without saying it; just like she always had done with her own husband.

"I know; I miss him too" Joy wrapped her arms tenderly around her son, and he finally seemed to accept it. Nothing would change the fact that he wanted Chris to be there, but at the very least they still had each other.

Danny seemed to linger back a little despite the fact that his own son Bunting was one of the people at the very front, especially considering the latter towered over most of the other people returning to the surface. Peering into his mind a little to see if there was anything I could do to help, I found that he was purposefully staying back to compose himself; he found the idea of telling Bunting that Jack was gone exceedingly daunting.

Bunting was technically a child of mine and Jack, as I had lent the latter an egg from my body to help bring Bunting into life; and this got proven more by the combining factors of Jack's tan skin and brown hair with my blue eyes and wavy hair. But even so, Danny had been present in his life as a true parent, so in all intents and purposes he was considered to be his father in every single way.

"Pops!" Bunting was too keen to miss him in the cluster of people waiting, and Danny smiled to himself the moment he heard his son's affectionate nickname for him. It had been a problem initially whenever Bunting had called out 'dad', as both of his fathers would then turn around. After a solution was found, Danny had proudly since gone by the moniker of 'Pops' instead. The two of them came together in a strong hug - one really wondered which one was stronger than the other sometimes - before Bunting peeled himself off the tired leader. "And dad?"

Danny couldn't manage to do anything beyond frown softly, shaking his head to signify that the other was not coming to join them. Bunting's characteristic smile soon left, hugging his father tightly again to give him support for the missing partner.

"He... He gave his life to save Mark" Danny did barely manage to find his voice, although it was a very quiet one. His son was quiet in response, but there was a hint of merriment to his voice.

"Yeah, that does sound like him" Bunting's voice seemed to meld laughter and sadness together in perfect amounts, soon blubbering softly into his father's leather jacket; using the stiff material to try and block out the sound of his sobbing. The other children and people coming from the bunker were polite enough to give them space, giving them a wide berth as they continued to flow out.

Turk came storming out the moment he could, his smaller body and weaker muscles making it impossible to shoulder his way through the crowd until it cleared for him. Utter panic was right on his face, as he couldn't quite spot his father right behind Ninja Brian, leaving him with the initial impression that neither of his parents had made it. Mark had spotted him however, and quickly brushed past his comrade right as he saw the despair appear in Turk's eyes.

"Son, hey..." Mark trailed off a little as he spoke, wondering what exactly was the right thing to say when Jesse wasn't going to be joining them. The two of them would have looked like younger and older versions of themselves, if it weren't for Turk's longer black hair and his mother's eyes. "I'm... Your mother is-

Turk didn't care at all for explanations, instead rushing himself into Mark's arms at such a speed that it knocked the wind right out of his father's lungs. While confused on why he didn't need an explanation, Mark soon curled his arms around his son; understanding that he was just endlessly relieved to see him there.

And finally, Roxy appeared, searching extensively for her two parents. She looked a lot like her mother in a lot of ways, the same hair and deep skin tone, but there was a slight hint of her father there in the fact that her hair curled quite a bit once it sprouted from her head. But sadly, she couldn't find either parent; a fact she of course couldn't have known beforehand.

Mila looked like she considered checking up on the young teenager herself, but paused with an uncertain look on her face. She didn't know whether Roxy would even take kindly to a stranger talking to her right then and there as it was.

 _"Ninja Brian, would you mind going to her?"_ I didn't want her to feel all lone, so I implored Ninja Brian to at least check up on her. He didn't respond, but before long I could make out the sounds of him walking over to her as she sniffled quietly to herself.

The masses of people coming out of the bunker all held brilliant smiles on their faces once they realised that we had won, as not only did it mean that they could return to their former lives just as easily as they had left them, but it heralded in a new age for the people of Pandora. No longer was it necessary to cower away from the bandits or Alpha of the world who thought that everything belonged to them. We no longer had to limit ourselves to simply surviving; we now could truly _thrive_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're not quite done yet folks! Stick around for another two chapters or so, and then we shall see the end of this long four year journey of ours! :3


	17. After the War; Farewell Flowers

Watching Ally command a massive speech to the people who had fought for her was invigorating and awe-inspiring in equal amounts to one another. Granted, it wasn't anywhere near as grand as the one I had given to the people within my movement before the fight, but it seemed that she didn't need extravagant words on her side.

"Burn this memory into your mind" She called out loudly from her platform, her volume reaching to such heights that I wondered whether she truly needed the microphone and speakers that had been set up for her. "Whenever someone tells you that you should lay down for injustice simply because it is the 'easier answer', then let this day serve as a reminder that it is never the answer. Fighting may cause heartache in several ways, but you should never shy away from it"

 **"Death to tyrants!"** Her army chanted back to her, sounding quite like her in several ways; protecting the weak with a violent gusto. It was only when Ally deemed the speech to be all that she needed to say, that the people following her finally let go. The majority of them started to cheer and throw their arms up excitedly in the air, another large amount begun to hug whoever happened to be closest to them, and very few started to prepare themselves to go back home for a well earned rest.

The same excited buzz still seemed to flow through Ally's veins as well; as I could notice excited jitters in her fingers even as she descended down the platform to meet me standing beside it.

"I guess most of the troops that came from Alfenheim and Zura will be heading home, as they've got specific rituals for their dead" Ally seemed to have learned a lot about the other planets in our solar system - quite specifically the large city planet in our solar system and the water/coral planet, as they undoubtedly provided her army with the most willing volunteers. When her blue eyes carefully swept over mine, I got the strong impression that she was silently asking me whether our people were going to be leaving so soon as well, but I was hoping to remain behind to mourn my more personal losses.

"Alfu has a pretty mixed culture, so we don't have anything specific that prevents us from staying" I admitted, as my own family didn't have many qualms about how we would be treated after we passed anyway. As long as I believed in the lord, the galaxy was free to do what it wished with my remains after I was gone... But I supposed that it was proper to allow my own troops and fellow pack members the option to return speedily home if they _did_ have something specific in mind. "I wasn't aware if Pandora had any tradition"

"We don't, generally. My specific town of Hope did develop its own naturally around twelve years ago; we burn their bodies so that they may scatter to the wind and join the other sands of our planet, followed by floating specific flowers across our ocean for their souls" Ally began to softly speak as she recounted a ceremony that she may have seen in the past, a lovely combination of happiness melding with nostalgia on her face. "...I must admit, I am hoping you guys will stay for the funerals. There are some people in your pack that I would like to say goodbye to"

While there was no trace of a pack link connecting us to tell me who she was referring to, I had the strong suspicion that the 'people in my pack' was Bryan. There had been the occasional time that he and I had talked about the strong Alpha leader on Pandora; divulging that while he and his two brother-in-laws had been working there, that the three of them held a strong connection to Ally. When asking them about how they would describe this relationship, each one would smile and say that they felt like she was their long-lost niece, cousin and adoptive daughter all rolled into one. As such, it didn't surprise me at all that hearing that Bryan gave his life for the movement meant more to her than anyone else.

"I need to ask the rest of my pack how they feel about it, but you can at least expect me to be there" I couldn't promise that everyone was going to be there, but I planned to be there. Her smile conveyed just how much she appreciated the fact that people were going to be joining her, and I was able to cross that slight barrier between us to gently loop my arm into one of her available ones. "Why don't you tell me how it goes? It may help to convince anyone who is unsure about it"

And tell me she did; telling vast stories about the different ones she had attended since it became a normality for her town. For singular deaths they would make a small pyre to burn their body, but for bigger gatherings they would grow the fire to a massive size; so large that often other neighbouring towns could see the flames trickle into the air. Whenever people felt comfortable to leave the flames, they would carefully make their way down the various pathways until they reached the oceans shore, and float special flowers onto it's cool waters.

What made the flowers special was the fact that you could pick one of two different types, each with their own special meaning. The real life flowers were for people who had come to terms with their loved ones deaths, effectively telling the spirits in the afterlife that everything was alright and that they were allowed to rest in peace. In contrast to those was the paper flowers, which were purposefully made blank so that the person holding the flower was able to write some last words to send to their dearly departed. After everything was said and done, the candle set into the flower would either burn it or release the petals to scatter across the ocean... And allow people to hopefully accept the new reality without them.

With that brilliant story soon being exchanged from her lips, to my lips and finally to the rest of my pack, all of the remaining members of my pack were happy to remain for the ceremony before heading home. Before long the sun left us to explore the other side of that massive planet, changing the strong heatwave to a sharp cold night.

The fact that our movement had fought in space meant that there were very little bodies to speak of despite our ten million death count. Only the body of Kevin remained for our tight-nit pack - and we knew quite well that he wanted to be buried beneath the ground on his home planet - so we respectfully declined the option when we were asked if we wanted to add any bodies to the growing pyre.

The sight of flames was... A mixed experience. There was a lingering sense of an uncomfortable nature based on how my father had passed away so long ago, but there was something tranquil about standing there and letting the residual warmth of those tender warm orange hues warm me in the colder parts of their town. I remained there to bask in the glow for a while - letting the occasional person talk to me if they felt like it - before I felt the inevitable draw to make sure that my partner was alright.

"Are you doing alright darling?" Katra noticed me turning around suddenly, probably assuming that it was because I was overcome with emotion. There was the slight hesitation in my mind in answering her question, as part of me wondered whether she was going to be reminded of Tanner's death if I brought up Paul, but eventually told her based on our long standing friendship. "Oh, of course, wanting to check up on the hubby. I think their doctor is set up in that tent over there"

"He's not my husband, remember?" I laughed softly, as Katra had always referred to him as my 'hubby' even when we made the dedicated decision to hold off on marriage until the war was settled. The cheeky gleam in her eyes told me that she knew that fact very well, evident from her following words.

"Not yet" She reminded me, winking very obviously in my direction in case I had difficulty seeing her gestures in the dim glow of the firelight. Blaire huffed on the other side of her, before flicking Katra's shoulders softly as if to tell her to behave herself.

Taking Blaire's gesture as an excuse to finally slip away, the tent was right on the outskirts of where the fire stood. I presumed it was for the injured people to still be involved in the ceremony if they so chose, and because one of the injured was Ally's husband - who undoubtedly wanted to be close to where she would be mingling.

I wasn't sure how etiquette worked with tents considering all of my life I had lived in solid buildings, but I tried to imitate a knocking gesture on the soft sandy coloured fabric standing in my way. Someone inside - I imagined that it was the doctor that Katra mentioned - told me that I was free to come in. Picking one side of the shut tent flap, I flipped it open and moved inside before most of the built up heat escaped from it.

"Hey, I was wondering when you were going to come visit" Paul tiredly greeted me, as he was sitting upright in the stretcher that he had been set up in now that he had been given some proper medication to push away the pain. He honestly was such a madman sometimes... But I loved him for it. The doctor seemed to be attending to him at that moment in time, but by the frown on his face it was not good news for the leg.

"Considering the fact nobody has come to tell me that they have your leg on ice somewhere, I'm guessing it has been several hours since this cut" The doctor seemed to speak to nobody in general, quickly going through the motions considering how many more patients he had to get to in that day. Even so, Paul nodded his head, and this prompted more words to come from the man treating him. "I'm sorry to say, but even if you were to retrieve it now, you likely won't be able to reattach it successfully. My best recommendation would be to get a skin graft at the end of the leg here, wear a prosthetic and do physical therapy to get used to your new way of moving around"

"That's alright" Paul had already accepted that walking around with both legs intact was no longer going to be an option for him, instead reaching out with his hand to gently hold one of mine as I came to sit beside him. "Frankly, living beyond today is already enough for me"

The doctor seemed to give a rare small smile, grateful that at least one of the plenty of people he had to work on was taking their new reality in their stride (figuratively of course). After carefully removing the instant-health vial from Paul's leg, he left us to it.

"It's times like these that I wish I was strong enough to carry you around" I sighed softly, as I knew that I wouldn't be able to carry Paul down to the ocean's shore. My head naturally came to rest on his shoulder, and his own followed shortly after to gently rub against the top of my head. "But hey, that's what Malaki is for, huh?"

The two of us laughed at that admission, grateful beyond words that we had made it beyond the day with each other. It didn't take that long for Malaki to come collect us, informing us that a bunch of people were already beginning to move to the flower floating portion of the ceremony. After bundling up Paul onto his back, we set off after them.

Ally's pack were the first ones to descend the pathway down the cliff that Hope rested on, acting as indicators for anyone who was waiting for permission to go down. Despite my initial slow start, I managed to follow shortly behind her with my own pack, feeling the way the wind swept off the ocean into my hair. It was cold, but not oppressively so; letting me pause for a brief moment and look over the ocean, which looked quite close to black under the cover of night. After imagining just how beautiful it would look with little candles adorning it, I truly understood why their tradition had lasted so long.

Considering we were one of the first ones down with the other pack, we were the first to approach the medic friend of Ally's - whose name was Jade, as I learned - and her husband Sean, who each wore patient smiles as they stood near giant bags filled to the brim with each of the flowers that were described to us.

"How many people are you saying goodbye to?" Sean asked me, as I naturally was at the front of everyone. I paused for a brief moment, as I wondered about who I was exactly going to take a flower for. Ally had told me that if multiple deaths happened that they preferred we not send out a flower for each individual person, as before long they would run out before everyone could get a flower.

"Um... One, please" I ultimately decided that I was going to be saying goodbye to Mayu, as I owed her a debt beyond words for taking my place at the very end of our space battle. After fetching out a picture of her to place in the flower as well, I handed off one of Gunner to Paul; as I imagined that the two of them would have an easier time finding their special flowers if they were released together.

"Live or paper?" Jade was the next one to pose a question, and it was yet again another thing that I hadn't quite considered yet. Neither of them hurried me as I stood there silently, and I could feel a gentle hand caress one of my shoulders; Matthias doing his best to silently reassure me that there was absolutely no shame in taking my time.

"...Live" Eventually the answer seemed clear to me, as it just somehow felt right to float that one. She already had told me right before sacrificing herself that she was doing it to let me live on with Paul, so it seemed only fair to let her and Gunner blissfully move on to heaven without a care in the world.

Paul ended up copying me when he went next, carefully reaching around Malaki's broad shoulders to handle the live flower for Gunner. Malaki and Trent both took a flower each for Corey as well as another for Trent's sister - Malaki taking a paper one and his husband picking two live ones - before they moved aside for Matthias. I was surprised to see that he didn't take either; as he said that he was simply there for support for the others if they needed it. Sean and Jade perfectly understood that, as they likely were in a similar role for their friends.

Marvin collected two once he saw Jfred taking none, both of which were paper in either of his hands. The next two widowers took differing flowers from each other - Bobby with his paper and Connor the live one - before Katra softly moved forward to collect a live one for Tanner.

"There's nothing you'd like to say to him?" Blaire was curious, wondering why the typically vocal Katra wasn't planning on spilling her soul to the heavens for Tanner to hear her.

"I'll see him again someday, so I'm not worried about that" Katra smiled softly down at the petite pink flower, gently feeling the way the petals were silky smooth against her fingers. "Besides, the live ones are prettier in my eyes"

With all of our flowers collected, we peeled off from those two collecting flowers so that other could could get their flowers if they so chose. Malaki soon placed Paul down on a nearby rock, before pulling two crutches from his belt that he had stuck there for Paul in case the pilot wanted to be able to walk around in a minimal manner. Thankfully, that rock was close enough to the water that he could bend down and float the flower over the ocean without having to dip his injured leg in any capacity.

I was the first to light my flower's candle, carefully igniting the small match before weaving it between the green petals of my flower. Rather than do a similar method, Paul carefully tilted his flower to the side so that his own candle could be lit from the already made flame; the pictures of Gunner and Mayu softly crinkling against one another as it did so.

"May the lord guide your souls" I softly wished those two well, before Paul and I slowly lowered them into the inky black water laying just beneath us... And let them go. Actually forcing my fingers to release the flower seemed to be one of the harder things I had to do in the war, but Paul's hand drifted softly to the side until it found mine; giving me that burst of confidence that I needed. Because of the proximity of our fingers, the flowers ended up tangling somewhat into each other, but this was perfectly alright in my eyes; as it seemed like they both were simply holding hands one final time as their green candles drifted out into the open water.

Malaki, Connor and Trent clumped together as a group similar to how Paul and I linked together, the three of them wading into the water until their waists (it was actually his upper thigh for Malaki, but that isn't that important) were submerged in water. Connor and Trent both released beautiful coloured flowers that ranged from blue to white, while I could spy that Malaki had chosen to write a small amount of words onto his paper to tell Corey something one final time. Before long, two flowers each were floated for both Amanda and Corey; who I knew would be pleased to see them safe and sound.

Bobby drifted away from the majority of us, clearly finding some kind of solace in being alone for the time being. I let him be, turning my head specifically away so that I wouldn't peer too closely at the neat handwriting he had emblazoned all over the sides of the paper flower in his hands.

Marvin... Clearly was having a rough go of things. He only managed to drift into the water up to his ankles, before the weight of his two brothers flowers - who held the smiling faces of Bryan and Kevin being reflected back in their pictures - brought him to a complete standstill. No amount of words that could be written on those paper ones - which people could see quite evidently that he had written on them until he absolutely had no more space - could seemingly make the realisation that his brothers were gone any easier.

"...I can't" He sobbed, just barely managing to not drop either flower as his arms trembled. They already had their candles lit on them, but putting them into the water seemed to be a far more monumentous task. "...God, I can't-

It seemed that Jfred and Matthias had seen this possibility coming, as they both softly came from either side to support their brother-in-law... Their _final_ remaining brother-in-law, making sure that both hands of his were softly cupped by their own; Jfred taking the side that held Kevin's picture while Matthias lingered on the side where Bryan was.

" _We_ can do this" Jfred reminded his brother that he never had to do something alone if he needed help, prepared to help Marvin send off the other two if he really needed it. Even with their support, Marvin still needed a second to gather himself - softly rubbing his eyes on the inside of his arm so that he was able to see somewhat - before slowly nodding to them both.

As a true family, they wandered into the water until the majority of them reached their knees, allowing them to gently bend down and place the paper flowers into the water. As though there were finally excited to be free, both of their flowers floated off the moment that Marvin let go, preventing him from reaching out to grab them back... But it seemed that he wouldn't have tried that anyway, standing up fully and holding tightly onto his brother's hands.

Last but not least was Katra, who comfortably stayed on the shore with Blaire by her side. She seemed to want to be last out of everyone, with her smiling softly and pressing a gentle kiss to the picture that she held of Tanner, before she slotted it into the spot next to her candle. The pink flower looked lovely when she daintily laid it into the water, with Katra and Blaire both watching on with pride.

Tanner's flower almost seemed to speed up to match its other friends, coming together with Sera's one to make one big cluster that was our dearly departed pack members. Taking one of Paul's hands to help guide his slowly moving form over to the rest of our pack, very soon I was pressed tightly into a hug that all of us shared as one.

Saying one last goodbye meant that we would not only let things go, but also be fully prepared to look to the future. And hey, considering what Paul and I had talked about in our 'possible' final dash to the battlecruiser in space, there was certainly equal amounts to cheer about soon.

* * *

"Goodbye old friend" I softly repeated that sentiment as I could see a paper flower float by me, it turning quite conveniently to show me a familiar face of Bryan. It seemed highly ironic to see him included in that bunch considering how twenty years ago he never wanted to be involved in the war, but... Well, heroes often couldn't resist the call to arms when they were needed.

"Ally, ye didn't take one?" Sean soon came checking up on me, as I had been one of the few to immediately skip by him and his wife when I reached the shore.

"I honestly made it out without many close losses; Dan and Michael are still here after all" I explained my reasoning on why I hadn't gotten one, my eyes naturally drifting to find where my pack was. Everyone there had gotten in the habit from a long time ago to gather enough flowers for each individual, before gathering as a group to release them. Mingled into the group was Dan, who stuck close to Phil and his daughters, as well as Michael sticking close to Roxy. When either of my special boys saw me looking, they would give me a soft wave and an equally pleased smile. "Besides, our pack has their specific way of handling it"

"Yeah, but yer not exactly joining them are ya?" Sean could tell that something was up, probing far more than any stranger would dare to do with me. He insistently checked inside my mind to see why I was keeping so far from the others, and it didn't take him long to uncover that I was still holding myself on that kind of 'leader' pedestal (almost literally, considering the boulder I stood on stretched out a little over the water of the ocean nearby); which meant that I thought it was improper to show favoritism while literally billions of other would be arriving shortly to say goodbye to their friends. Sean considered that attitude to be ridiculous, and it clearly showed from his initial derisive snort and his following words. "Ye do realise that ye 'ave to stop being the leader some day, right?"

My very first instinct was to bite back at him - figuratively of course - maybe even tell him that I wouldn't tolerate him talking to me like that... But when I considered the fact that he dared to talk to me about that, it meant that he knew that he cared about me. The war was over after all, so in all honesty he was right in every way that I shouldn't cut people out based on what some of my troops might think. And if any of my troops considered it to be bad or cowardly in any manner, then they could sincerely go fuck themselves.

"...Yeah, you're right" I eventually was able to admit that aloud, my arms carefully coming down from their tense posture crossed in front of my chest. It cost extra effort to not grin when I saw the cheeky smirk on his face from the admission, but I wanted to be doing something else than starting a mock wrestling battle with him for my pride. "Let me know if you or Jade need a break"

"Will do" Sean gave me a quick thumbs up at the very same time as he made that response, winking at me like the close compatriot I always knew him to be. I didn't doubt his honesty about coming to get us if it was required; as I could see that Jade was flanked by her son nearby the two flower bags that we had laid out for people joining us.

With him scampering off back to help Jade with the steadily growing amount of people waiting for their flowers, I took my newly acquired free time to clamber off the rock and head over to my pack nearby. They all felt my presence as I approached, the majority of them turning their heads to give me gentle smiles now that I wasn't being a stranger to them anymore.

Dan stepped gently off to the side from Phil, opening his good side (not his dominant side, ironically enough) to me. With my left arm curling around his waist and my son quickly coming to clasp his arms around my neck not a moment later, I felt like the luckiest woman in the world; and it was only made even better with the grand view in front of me in the form of endless flowers bobbing on the water's calm surface. That calm, truly felt like it could last a lifetime.


	18. After the War; To the Future

I never truly would have said that I cared about what kind of clothing I would wear, but there I was three months later; fiddling with two different ties in my hands. Was it considered to be rude to show up completely decked out in white to a wedding that wasn't mine?

"Muuummm! You're hogging the mirror!" Michael whined, trying to peer over my shoulder to correct his own suit. While inheriting some of Dan's and my height, he was not quite tall enough to see much more. Dan stood by - seemingly having the same problem as I from the red tie and dark blue he was mulling over - finding it more funny than irritating to see his two loved ones lightheartedly bicker together.

"Come now, your mother hasn't had the opportunity to get dressed up in a long time" He gently reminded Michael that this wasn't a normal thing for me, as frankly it had been a long time since I broke out that white suit. "Besides, you've gotten to hog this room to yourself for a long while"

It was true; Dan and I had made the decision that while he and I were often away, that we weren't going to take up much space in our smaller house. Because of this Michael ended up gaining the entire second floor of our house, while we - the parents - would take a tiny room on the ground floor. While it had seemed like nothing more than a decision based on logic at the time, I saw what it truly was after all that time; a silent way for us both to apologise for the fact he was born to two parents intent on fighting a war.

"Still not sure about the tie?" My husband softly asked me with a tender smile on his face, his mind clearly conveying that the sight of me in my 'dressed up' state was bringing up familiar memories of our wedding tie. He had settled for the dark blue tie on his own black suit, and I copied him by settling on the red one in my right hand; the both of us taking a tie that was not the one at our own wedding. As my fingers glided over the smooth material to nestle it around my neck, I could hear him sigh softly in a combination of happiness and nostalgia. "I remember the momentary outrage your father had when you showed up in a suit instead of a dress"

"I think it was more down to the fact he had always envisaged what I would look like on my wedding day, and that generally involved a flowing gown" I chuckled as I remember my father's eyes nearly popping out of his head when he was about to lead me down the isle. Although he had asked me whether I was certain about my choice, he didn't fight it when I assured him that it truly felt more like 'me' than anything else would. "It's been a while since I got to dress up nicely. It's relaxing to know that I can now"

"Is that since I was born, or since the war was confirmed?" Michael asked us that at the same time as he insistently shouldered his way between us to inspect his own formal wear. He clearly had meant to ask it in a non-confrontational manner, but there was the slight edge to his tone; as we knew full well that he never was one hundred percent happy with our decision, but knew it was the right thing to do in equal measures.

"After our marriage to be honest, but the war probably didn't help" I felt that we had the right to be honest with each other now that the threat of the Alpha were not looming over our heads, and my son answered with a simple hum. He wasn't linked to us via a pack link, but let's call it a motherly instinct that told me that he thought the answer made sense. "I had always felt that occasions like these ones should be kept special"

"Speaking of special occasions, that means that you'll be wearing that same suit to Michael's wedding to Scott" Dan cheekily teased his son, gently using one of his bony elbows to poke him in the shoulder. Michael faked a gag, clearly finding the idea of getting married to be too soon at that time; finding it to be enough that Scoot was his plus-one to Mila's wedding.

"Just because you two got married at eighteen and twenty-five respectively, doesn't mean Scott and I have to rush into anything" Michael sharply jabbed the both of us back with his own equally pointy elbows, but they felt quite weak to me simply because of my class type. Even with the momentary blip of pain slipping past Dan's mind, we both laughed - as it was true; Dan and I had gotten married relatively quickly to some couples. Before the conversation could progress any further, we heard knocking come from our door downstairs, which gave Michael an excuse to duck away. "Ah, saved by the bell. That's probably Roxy, since I invited her to come here first"

I couldn't help but smile as I saw Michael dash down the stairs of our house, loving every moment that I now could be his mother with no distractions.

Dan gave a soft gesture with his head towards the stairs, asking me silently whether I was ready to go. I took one more moment of time to inspect my reflection in the mirror, seeing my white suit - it frankly had turned a creamy colour due to the amount of sun and desert sand that had seeped into it - perfectly encapsulate who I was in every manner. After curling my arm around to offer him my arm, we both followed after our son.

Roxy hadn't arrived alone in her twirled red skirt and long-sleeved black shirt combo; as Scott was standing right next to her in a sleek grey suit of his own that accompanied his blonde, short wavy hair quite nicely. Dan had never quite gotten over the fact that his son's boyfriend was almost exactly the same height as he was, but it had never particularly bothered me in any manner; I had accepted the fact that most of the next generation were going to be taller than me anyway.

"Well, don't you two certainly look fetching!" Scott openly compliment us in a way that subtly implied that he and Michael had been together long enough to become accustomed to us, as two years had given the three of us plenty of time to become close friends. "Hun, why don't you ever convince your parents to dress up nicely from time to time?"

"Probably because dressing like an emo and a bad bitch is their go-to style" Michael clearly was in that stage where he was starting to get embarrassed about how we dressed commonly, but the only one blushing and getting flustered was my husband.

"Hey now, if you think this is him being emo then you haven't seen anything" I laughed, as Dan wore far less black now that he was older than when I had first met him. "When I first met him, he-

"Alright! Let's see if anyone else is ready!" Dan grew far too worried about exactly I was going to be telling them, as there was the common theme of him being embarrassed about what his past self had done. The only positive thing that he would ever say about his past self would be his taste in woman, as that had naturally been what led him to me. With Scott giggling behind us, he and the other two teenagers followed us towards the outskirts of town where the rest of our pack had agreed to wait for one another.

We seemed to be the last ones to arrive, as the pack had already been settled into the sand by the time we arrived.

Joy was doing her best to help Kent - who seemed to still be a tad bit small for his father's suit - but at the very least he looked decidedly masculine; just like he had always wanted from a young age.

Sarah had embodied her mother (especially how she looked in her youth) in a lot of manners, wearing Lissa's oversized special hoodie with shorts - while Jenny ran around excitedly around Phil and his dark blue suit, in her bright yellow dress.

Jade had decided to wear her mermaid wedding dress from her own marriage ceremony, but of course the long fabric would dip into the sand if she were to walk; so Sean was currently carrying her around bridal style. Sam looked just like his father in their matching red suits, even going as far to insist that he too could carry his mother if the need arose, but so far his dad was fine with shaking his head and continuing to nestle his wife close to him.

Mark seemed to be quite anxious about attending a wedding that wasn't a close friend's one, as he was continuously undoing and redoing the bow-tie that Turk was wearing, despite the fact he likely could have paid attention to his own loose tie. After the fifth time of doing so - after I had arrived there of course - Turk huffed and told his father to give it a rest. He did reluctantly give up, and Turk was completely unfased by the fact that his bow-tie was slightly crooked.

"Eyy! My brother from the _same_ mother!" Bunting excitedly called out for his half-brother Michael, barreling forward to envelop him and Scott into what looked to be quite an enthusiastic hug. I had noticed that Bunting had turned his residual regret over his fathers death in his interactions with others... But far from reacting angrily, he seemed to triple his love instead. And the smile on Michael and Scott's face seemed to say that they were completely fine with this.

Even Ninja Brian had decided that the occasion was special enough to warrant wearing a sleek suit from head to toe. Well... Nearly head to toe, as he still was wearing his ever-present ninja hood on his face.

"You're at least going to take that off when Mila walks down the aisle, right?" I couldn't help but ask him, as while we in the pack weren't bothered by him wearing the cloth almost all of the time, I could see Mila wanting people to not hide themselves after winning the war.

" _Not by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin"_ He sassily answered me within his mind, before speed walking a distance away so that our thoughts wouldn't bleed so easily over to one another. I huffed softly, but I didn't have to babysit him in that moment when Danny swooped in from behind me.

"Don't worry, I'll get him to do it" Danny had opted for his old clothing of leather jackets and matching pants, with a neat design of some kind of upcoming rock band on his shirt. His mind conveyed that it was done expressly because of his partner no longer being there; the clothing sparking a kind of reminiscent memory of how he and Jack had looked when they first fell for each other. Since then comfortable clothing such as turtlenecks and sweatpants were more common for them, but today was a special day.

Before long we all started to trek over the sands towards Opportunity, where we all would be able to catch a ship to Alfu. With the seemingly endless amount of spare time that people had after the war, the road to our nearby city was no longer a dirty sandy trek over the nearby dunes; it now being a fully fleshed rock road. But while that was impressive, the thing that generally caught the most attention was the gapin hole in the nearby mountain, a massive testament to what we had done. We paid it some small respect by stopping to admire it for a short moment in time - the teenagers 'oohing' and 'aahing' at it considering they didn't have the first-hand experience of seeing it happen.

Before long we arrived to the city; the front gate no longer being intimidating because of the turrets not being aimed at anyone coming nearby in fear, the rich old inhabitants believing that random strangers would 'ruin' their paradise. The original denizens that lived in Opportunity were no longer there after the invasion of the Alpha, but it had since been revived by a large portion of my army. People who had nowhere to go - or even people from an entirely different planet who wanted to start anew - had started to rebuild it all, with the very first thing to catch their attention being the spaceport.

Walking through those doors felt astounding, especially when we had a beautiful view of a recently arrived ship gently lowering into one of the large docking ports. While we had to stick close to one another to get through the crowds, before long we could spot the final two people who we had hoped to join us to Alfu.

"Hey, there's my special boy!" My father Rory was ecstatic to see his grandson, even gently squeezing his way through the crowd so that they could both tightly hug one another. Willamena was a bit more reserved (she never liked crowds much), instead waiting for us to reach her. Due to the fact that most of us parents didn't have parents of our own - Pandora wasn't exactly a very good place to raise a family a number of years ago - both Willamena and Rory were more than happy to be the entire pack's parents and grandparents in equal measures. "Roxy, how are you doing honey?"

"It's been... Rough in some aspects, good in others" Roxy was honest with him, as of course three months were not long enough to get used to or be fine with her parents passing away. It could take her years, as grieving was never cut and dry. "I made a bomb into an alarm clock recently, so that's cool"

"Don't you mean an alarm clock into a bomb?" Sam couldn't help but ask her, but no; she was one hundred percent serious.

My mother came to me first, her arms softly curling around me into a familiar hug. When she and my father had heard my declaration to fight against the army coming towards Pandora, there had been the legitimate worry in both of their minds that they would end up outliving me... Which the nervous shaking in my mother's hands only reinforced further.

"We did it mum" I assured her that I was fine and that we gave the enemy hell in equal amounts, but considering she was quite the pacifist I could imagine that she wasn't interested in the latter. Pulling apart, I could clearly see the proud smile on her face; one that I knew she would have given me even if I had done my best but ultimately failed. "Now come on, we've got a wedding to get to"

* * *

The sky certainly was clear enough to view the occasional ship soaring by, but so far none of them looked large enough to be transporting plenty of people from one planet to another.

"They'll get here" Joey assured me that I had nothing to worry about, as he knew that Ally certainly kept to her word. He looked like he was more ready than I felt, but that likely came down to jitters rather than anything else. "Matthias is likely going to have a stroke if he can't attend to your hair soon however"

"Last I checked, he was still stuck between the two different styles" I giggled, before letting him softly lead me back into the recently converted church on the outskirts of our city. It wasn't quite the memorable place like our helicarrier and our old company building from yonder time, but I distinctly remembered from pictures in my father's photo albums that this was the one he and my mother had gotten married in.

Matthias and Marvin were the ones largely scurrying around in the lobby still, Matthias fiddling with a mannequin head so that he wouldn't bother me endlessly while Marvin was getting the last people settled into their seats. Katra had covered the lobby and subsequent church pews with brilliant purple sashays of ribbons, before she topped it off with brightly coloured flowers; making it all look brilliant.

"What did that poor wig ever do to you?" Joey couldn't help but poke fun at his older brother, who was tugging quite harshly against one particular strand to see whether it would fit in the design he was trying to make.

"I was mulling over a couple of designs" Matthias sighed deeply, giving up on the mannequin head now that we were close enough to the ceremony. We were collectively waiting for the last special people in our small wedding - I suppose it was quite obvious who the last people were, considering I was scouring the skies for her, her pack and her family earlier - and it made Matthias just that little bit eager to make it truly spectacular. "I was thinking of doing your hair up in a bun and doing your makeup like it usually looks since that was the same way you looked when you both started to date each other... But then I thought it might look too typical, so I started to experiment on the wig"

I couldn't help but titter softly when I peered around Matthias, as the wig truly looked like it had just rolled out of bed by that point. While we had held off with doing anything special with my makeup or hair style, it felt like it would mean a lot to Paul for me to just come down the aisle as... Well, myself.

"Actually, I think sticking with the natural look and long hair feels right today" I eased his mind about that, further doing so when I could detect a small flicker of concern slipping through his mind. He shouldn't worry about me 'settling for less' as it was my choice in every regard rather than ignoring it to speed things up. Although, the thought of hurrying down the aisle to Paul did sit better with me than I would have imagined. "Besides, I feel like there should be no reason to mess with perfection"

"Hah! I'll make sure to tell Katra you said that" Marvin chuckled heartily with my confident remark about myself, as my longtime friend in Katra had always told me to be more sassy in several regards. But long before we could get carried away by talking about old sayings that had become custom in our pack, Marvin's eyes lit up with recognition as he looked out the door. Before long that recognition melded into a wide smile, his hand gesturing the new arrivals inside.

It surprised me in no regard (it did please me however) that the people coming through the door were Ally and her pack. A couple of faces looked vaguely familiar from what I had seen of them at the bunker three months prior, but the easiest face to recognise was Ally's; as she was the only one to pause briefly in the middle of her loved ones.

She looked like an absolutely magnificent beacon of light in the midst of dark colours that the others wore around her, and it didn't take her long to pick me out next to Joey. Her stop was brief - just long enough to give me a confident smile - before strutting right after her group into the church like the self-assured diva that she was. Her dressing in a suit seemed like such a power move, and it filled me with the confidence I needed to walk down the aisle.

"So, everyone's here now" Matthias allowed his shoulders to droop as he said that, the three of us being the only ones remaining there after Marvin joined the others at the end of the aisle. He almost looked disappointed with the fact that my arms was softly slung around Joey's, as it gave the impression that I wanted the younger Frederick brother to give me away.

But there was one prediction that I had gotten right about my wedding, it was still up in the air who was going to walk me down the aisle. My father had passed away before he got the chance to meet Paul after all, and my mother had also joined the lord long before he had. Since then it had been quite the interesting topic to bring up in the pack; as Joey, Matthias and Bryan often bickered with each other on who was the best platonic soulmate/pack member to give me away. The latter in that trio... Was not able to give me away anymore, but I could easily have seen him beside me in that moment if he were.

Finding the decision to be easy, I reached out with my available right arm to drag Matthias to me - him quickly relenting despite my weaker strength than his - and the blissful smile on my face was enough to know that having them both give me away was the perfect solution. They too grinned once they took in my choice, looking like the proudest men in the universe when they walked with me to the closed doors keeping us apart.

"Are you ready?" Joey couldn't help but sound utterly excited, the emotions brimming to such a state in him that it felt like an infectious wave of euphoria passing through us.

"More ready than I have ever been" With that admission coming from me, Joey leaned forward ever so slightly to knock on the doors at the same time that his older brother softly brought the veil in front of my face; a signal to Trent who was waiting by them on the other side. Trent undoubtedly gave some other hand signal to the kind musician that we had gotten to play on the large organ. With the music telling us that they were ready, both Matthias and Joey took a door handle each, opening it with a wide sweeping gesture into the lovely white walls.

Trent was smiling right in front of us in his soft pastel pink suit, a basket filled with various differing coloured petals slung over his arm in preparation to being sprinkled over the aisle in front of us. Letting him walk ahead of us just a bit, I admired the fact that he took careful time to reach in with his hand to pick out bunches of them before floating them in a spiral pattern. He had always been the inventor alongside Corey during our company years, but he told me that special moments like these deserved a personal touch... And it looked mesmerizing in many regards.

My hands curled comfortably around both brothers arms as I walked my heels over the soft red carpet padding our way, my eyes naturally drifted to either side of pews. The left side was filled to the brim with people that I recognised from our movement - CJ, Jon, Mitch, you name it - and I naturally smiled to each one when their eyes caught mine. The right was comfortably sitting the entire pack from Pandora, but somehow Ally seemed to catch my attention the most out of them; especially so when she softly mouthed 'you look beautiful' to me.

If I thought that was enough to bring me to tears, that was clearly nothing to when I turned my head to look at my pack members waiting at either side of the altar; as they had prepared something special while keeping it a well hidden surprise. Each person standing there was holding some sort of picture frame within their hands, and it only took a closer glance to see that each picture held a picture of someone who hadn't quite made it... The pack members that I had wanted to be there in person, but at the very least had their smiling faces on display.

Marvin comfortably nestled both his brothers pictures in either of his hands, Malaki beside him held Corey with Trent right next to him holding Gunner's one from a long time ago. Connor and Bobby's smiles seemed to match the ones belonging to their wives in their pictures, truly living on to give joy to the world in every manner. And on the other side were my bridesmaids, Katra proudly displaying Tanner while Blaire took great honour in holding one that belonged to Mayu. Well and truly, the tears beginning to gather in my eyes were thanking the option to not wear my typical goth eyeshadow.

Last but certainly not least was Paul, who had been situated in a chair while he waited for me. By the time I had reached halfway down the aisle he carefully enlisted Connor (his best man) to help him up from a sitting position - taking special care to not upset his leg, as he wasn't quite used to the prosthetic he wore - before standing on his own two feet for me. It didn't surprise me at all that he had taken the opportunity to break out the marmalade orange service uniform of his, and I felt that it fit quite well considering the monumental war that we had both fought.

"Go get him tiger" Joey managed to slip that last little bit of cheekiness in once we reached the end of the path, with Matthias and him softly ushering me towards my fiancée.

Paul was more than happy to hold out both of his hands to help me up that last little step onto the altar, our fingers softly interweaving into one another. While highly scandalous, I found myself drifting off from the bishop's voice as he spoke, my entire attention spoken for due to my utterly wonderful man across from me. The only things to also catch my attention during that time were when we softly slipped our wedding bands on each other, reciting our vows to always love and grow with each other, and most importantly the 'I do's'. Some might have considered that we had waited eighteen years too long, but to us it was utterly perfect.

"And by the powers vested in me, I now pronounce you husband and wife" The bishop proudly pronounced as married, and it was right then that I was extremely grateful for my Omega class type; as I could have easily imagined crushing Paul's poor fingers in excitement were it otherwise. That feeling only surged higher once the bishop softly turned to look at Paul, uttering the words that most people were excited to hear on their wedding days. "You may kiss the bride"

I could see the visible discomfort in his face when he tried to shift his right leg forward to reach me - his leg pulsing in pain in he attempted to make sharp, jerky movements - so it fell upon me to close the distance myself, bringing my arms up and around his neck and pressing my lips against him softly. The loud cheering of all of our guests soon were chiming in our ears, and I couldn't have felt happier if I tried.

Being swept away from the chapel to where we were holding our reception was done extremely smoothly, as Marvin, Trent and Katra had planned for it all to be 'the most brilliant day of our lives'. Personally, I was quite looking forward to other days that could top that one.

Sitting at several different tables in our venue of choice, I just loved the view of the white sugar flowers that decorated the middle of each individual table. And while I loved each member of our pack, there only was space for four people at our table. Originally I would have liked the four men who caught my attention at the beginning of my time at the P.W.C. to sit all around that table with me. But seeing as Tanner and Gunner weren't able to be there, Katra and Blaire took their places quite happily, all of us eating from the white wedding cake that had special black waterfalls running down the sides.

"As the best man, I'd like to say my speech now. I figure it's best to do it after having a bite of cake, but not before everyone gorges on the beautiful food that Marvin and Trent made together" Connor said that right after people seemed to quiet down when he rang the glass, most people giving a polite bit of laughter to the short joke he gave. Part of me felt that he was going to make jokes the entire time, but when I saw the tender smile on his face it was clear that he likely was going to be giving my earlier tears a run for their money. "...Honestly, it sounds odd, but when Paul and Mila first met each other I frankly thought the two of them were horrible for each other. A flighty pilot and the energetic goth girl? It was quite the sight the first time I saw them flirt, let me tell you"

Yet again, another smattering of laughter - this time no longer out of a sense of politeness but because they genuinely seemed to enjoy it. But I wasn't worried; I knew how this story would eventually end.

"To most, Paul was the joker of the company; didn't take anything seriously in his life. But Mila, she quickly seemed to show that what we knew of him was just an initial personality that we never truly saw beyond. Around her, he truly opened up to be the best friend a guy could ask for and a true gentleman to whatever woman he met" Connor regaled the story of how we met each other, but from the perspective of an outsider in that situation. I could feel Paul gently squeeze my fingers as he heard this story, and yet again I wondered just how I had gotten so lucky with him. "The both of them are the definition of a power couple. Quite literally, along with Ally and Dan respectively-

Dan and Ally both raised their glasses, accepting the praise with open arms and proud grins.

-Ensuring that all of us can look to the future with hope. May they always support each other; until death do they part" Connor finished off his speech brilliantly, everyone else in attendance raising their glasses in agreement. And even though it likely wasn't common, Paul and I raised ours as well to be as one with everyone in attendance. "Now! You can either have some fun dancing with others after the happy couple, or stuff yourself silly. Both are completely valid, and I'll likely go for the second after a short dance"

By that point it seriously was a shame that he hadn't gone down the comedic route, as he was doing quite well at it - people still showing signs of merriment after he placed his glass down. My mind quickly shifted over to my darling recently-become-husband, as the thought of the first dance sounded like it was going to be a little... Difficult to pull off without him shuffling around in pain. He caught my eye before long; clearly reading my mind enough to feel my worries.

"Don't worry" Paul assured me that things were going to be fine, a cheeky wink to supplement his confident tone. His mind told me that there apparantely was a plan in motion to combat his new leg's problems, but he was keeping it under wraps just enough so that it would remain a surprise. "You go on ahead, I'll get there in just a second"

With the sound of people gently pulling apart tables to make room, I supposed that there was no harm in already heading to the center of the room. There were similar sounds to my own footsteps that Paul was hobbling behind me, with Connor likely helping him there. It was only when I heard the sound of tape being unfurled that I got too curious for me own good, turning around to face my husband and his best man... With Connor taping his left leg to Paul's right one, before the both of them proudly were able to shift his right leg without causing any pain.

"And here I thought I couldn't ever be more of a third-wheel for you both" Connor certainly had been around quite a bit during Paul and my relationship (especially near the beginning, as he had been dating me for a short while as well), but neither of us truly thought of him as such. Moments like these only proved how great of a friend he was, and we would gladly have him as our platonic soulmate until the ends of the universe. "Let's give these people some lovely twirls, eh?"

It wasn't nearly as smooth sailing as planned - there were times when we wanted to twirl and Connor misunderstood - but it only resulted in laughter when my shoe would accidentally bump into the prosthetic leg that belonged to Paul. It wasn't a touch sensitive one, so it luckily did nothing more than make a ' _thunk'_ noise. But even so, getting that first dance with Paul meant the world to me.

The sound of giggling dance partners soon joined in with the cute music we had playing, showing that others had taken us dancing together as a signal to come out on the dance floor if they so wished.

"Guess it's time to dance with our adoring public" Paul chuckled, before purposefully using one of his hands to gently spin me in a circle. At the height of my twirl he softly released me, leaving me to twirl there for a bit before someone else could come along to dance with me if they wished. From the sounds of it he was trying to shift around with Connor to do a three legged dance with him; like an odd tango.

I wasn't alone for long; the sound of someone confidently striding over the dance floor from the sidelines, their hand able to reach in to slip into mine and bring me to a gentle halt. Their hand wasn't immediately familiar - it was long and slender unlike most males, but there was a hint of roughness to them as well - and the sheer fact that I couldn't detect anything from their mind meant it couldn't be someone within my own pack. Lo and behold, it was Ally in her soft white suit.

"You certainly do look happy" She remarked on the practically permanent smile on my face, and that very same feature seemed to beam when she pointed it out. "I'd certainly say that you deserve it"

"As do you" I couldn't help but easily pass back the sentiment to her, and her grin seemed to match mine perfectly. "I hope we'll be seeing far more of each other now that we have endless amounts of free time"

"That we do" Ally managed to combine her words seamlessly with another gentle twirl, allowing my white lace wedding dress to flutter out into the shape of a circle around me. "We've done well together"

Neither of us could say that we did things perfectly... As prevention was far better than the cure for something. But even if our losses had been greater, part of me firmly believed that we still would have gone through with it; for those who couldn't. And as a reward, we had quite the brilliant future to look forward to.

**The End**

**(This series is made in honour of my two Great-Uncles who died during World War Two. Their names were Hendrick Jan Fokma and Klaas Erik Fokma, who fought against the Nazi regime by joining the resistance.**

**Like them - and like Ally and Mila within this book - do not let things like the Alpha/Nazi's/Neo-Nazi's ever happen again. As John Stuart Mill once said; "Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing")**


End file.
